Day trip from San Jose to Los Angeles
Last Saturday, I had to go to Los Angeles for a meeting - and the nature of the meeting kind of required that one travel by train. I wanted to depart no earlier than Friday evening, so I wouldn’t need to take the day off. Is it even possible to go from Mountain View (well, San Jose) to Los Angeles and back in one day - and be at a meeting from 10am to 3pm?
Well, it is, but it takes just about a full 24 hours to do the trip and it involves more buses than trains (well, they’re Amtrak buses, so they almost count as trains …):
- Take the new overnight bus from San Jose (departure: 12:10am) to Santa Barbara
- Connect with the first Pacific Surfliner (train #768) out of Santa Barbara (6:45am) and arrive in Los Angeles at 9:25am
- To return, take the San Joaquin bus connection leaving Los Angeles at 3:10pm
- Arrive in Bakersfield at 5:55pm and connect to San Joaquin train #703 leaving at 6:10pm
- Arrive in Stockton at 10:15pm and connect to the bus to San Jose, leaving at 10:20pm and arriving in San Jose at 11:55pm
Total trip time: 23 hours and 45 minutes
What you get:
- No Amtrak parking at the San Jose station, since you need a permit, but the ticket office closes at 11pm …
- Not a lot of sleep on the bus during the night …
- Nice morning views of the Pacific Ocean before and after Santa Barbara
- A bus ride over the Grapevine (also known as Tejon Pass) with hopefully not too much traffic and a bus driver that doesn’t do races with his colleagues
- An uneventful train ride through the flat and surprisingly green (but scorchingly hot) Central Valley
- A late evening bus ride over Altamont Pass - in my case with only one other passenger on the bus
All in all, a good trip and ontime all the way. I wouldn’t do the overnight bus again though - while it is quite convenient, I’ve never been the type to be able to sleep on airplanes and as it turns out, I can’t really sleep on buses either. Now if they could only do this as a train all the way and have a sleeper on it …
Oh yes, and if we actually had High Speed Rail instead of only talking about it, I would have been able to leave San Jose at 7am and spent no more than 2 1/2 hours each way - I’d have been back home by 6pm …
Union Pacific freight train passing through Santa Barbara.
The UP freight rolls away into the sunrise.
Early morning along the Pacific Ocean between Santa Barbara and Ventura - that’s why they call it the “Pacific Surfliner”!
Surfliner trainset at Los Angeles Union Station.
“Drive me, will train” - But I don’t want to drive (or ride …) a bus, I want a train!
Which Amtrak bus is faster? Is that part of the training, too?
San Joaquin train in Bakersfield.
Posted in: Uncategorized | July 19, 2006 11:01 pm
4 Comments »
Aaron B. Hockley, on July 20, 2006 @ 8:20 am
I really like the second (into the sunrise) photo. Thanks for the trip report.
Ben, on July 20, 2006 @ 11:02 am
Why didn’t you take the Coast Starlight? Because of its mammoth delays of late? Great pictures!
Marcel Marchon, on July 20, 2006 @ 10:10 pm
I didn’t take the Starlight because I wanted to do a day trip and the Starlight is a day train from L.A. to San Jose and v.v. It just wouldn’t have worked with the meeting.
Ganesh, on October 14, 2007 @ 12:25 am
Hi,
Wonderful pictures and narration which made me try a similar trip as well…
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