My best Amtrak story was when, in 1992 or so, I made a cross-country trip on the old George Washington (C&O), which Amtrak called the Cardinal.
It ran from Chicago to New York, and we rode it from Indianapolis to Manassas, Virginia, to visit relatives.
The route is beautiful, and slow, and goes past the town of White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, about nightfall.
The scenery is spectacular, and I spent much time with my wife and young son in the cafe car, looking out the window.
At the time I still smoked, and Amtrak had just instituted its no smoking policy. So that meant you had to go between the cars, or stand out on the end of the last car, to have a smoke. It was cold and off-and-on raining, but no big deal.
Especially after several beers in the cafe car.
So I remember standing on the end balcony of the last car, in the dark of night, watching a railroad guy on the ground, a half-mile away, astride the tracks, swinging his oil lamp back and forth in a slow arc, after the train had started moving again and was picking up steam, leaving him in the distance.
And this very pleasant mist was being drawn up, from the Venturi effect of the train going so fast over the tracks.
The scene was the very essence of the romantic lure of rail travel, or so I thought.
After a few minutes I realized that is was not raining.
Rather, the old cars treated the efflux of the sleeper cars' toilets and sinks with the "fast track" treatment, if you know what I mean.
This was the source of the 'mist'.
This freaked me out, but I couldn't tell my wife, or she would not have let me back into the sleeper car. And maybe never allowed me indoors at home again, I don't know.
I would have been permanently assigned outdoor status, like a mastiff.
Anyway, this is another reason not to smoke.
I do hope that trains in the future have some kind of lavatory tanks so that pedestrians standing by a TGV-type train are not given the Jackson Pollock treatment as it passes them at 250 mph!
Regards, caddie