It was meant to be reassuring, but when my waiter in his starched white tunic informed me that the train had Wi-Fi, I immediately imagined the lounge carriage filled with silent riders staring into their hand-helds and that was exactly the world I was trying to leave behind when I boarded the vintage Pullman Cars of Pullman Rail Journeys (PRJ). Thankfully, it was nothing like that as we rolled out of Chicago's Union Station with our cocktails and chardonnays and easy conversation picked up between passengers as the canapés came floating out of the kitchen.
This was exactly what Edwin Ellis, the president of Iowa Pacific Holdings (IPH), which operates PRJ, hoped to revive when he began restoring his collection of classic Pullman carriages. IPH acquired 70 of the world's approximately 500 existing Pullman carriages in order to revive an era of travel in which people engaged with each other as they traveled.
In March 2013, with eight carriages completed, PRJ launched its first reclamation of sophisticated American rail travel with the City of New Orleans train, the same line celebrated in the Steve Goodman Song made famous by Arlo Guthrie. The 19-hour, 934-mile ride between Chicago's Union Station and Union Station New Orleans is a true American journey connecting two great cities, both known for authentic music and architecture.
Authenticity is the key to the experience. I was apprehensive that the carriages would recreate an opulent faux past that wasn't true to the spirit of the historic Pullman. That spirit was never ostentatious either in design or service. The American attributes of Pullman quality required service standards that were exacting, but not European, not modeled on the service required of aristocrats from servants. Likewise, Pullman design abstains from baroque ornament and aspires more for the straight elegant lines of art deco.
The staff is attentive and friendly, open to conversation, and not aloof. It's a mistake to think of it as a luxury experience, because the beauty of the experience is about historic authenticity. The food, which is wonderfully prepared and served, expresses the history perfectly as the kitchen serves such classic mid-20th century American dishes as Roast Beef Tenderloin, Pan Seared Salmon and Herb Roasted Chicken Breast.
The prices include alcoholic beverages and three full meals. Heading south out of Chicago, a cocktail hour is followed by dinner and breakfast is served in the morning and a light lunch before disembarking. The accommodations, which range in price from $500 per person each way to $1,950 for a twin cabin, are modest in the tradition of the original Pullman service. The company uses yield management software that's comparable to the kinds airlines use and thus there is fare flexibility in booking as the software will fill the train with discounting if it must.
The top-rated cabins are comfortable but small. On the other end of the spectrum, the cabins feature upper and lower berths that come down murphy-bed style from the wall. The quarters are tight and the bathrooms are basic. My wife and I traveled in a two berth upper and lower "cabin" that was small enough to evoke memories of the stateroom scene the Marx Brothers' Night at the Opera when we both tried to dress for breakfast at once. Luxurious no. Convenient no. Authentic yes. That's the way Americans traveled on trains back in the day.
In their painstaking recreation of an era, the company deserves credit for not turning the trains into something they never were. It would have been almost vandalism of our history if they had added a gym car or a spa as some luxury trains do these days. Though the trains do have modern conveniences such as Wi-fi and A/C, few other concessions have been made. The fabrics, the linens, cutlery and china are accurate down to the patterns on the silverware. We owe that devotion to authenticity to Ellis, who is spending between $750,000 and $1.2 million per car to restore them to the most exacting standards of historic detail.
The Chicago/New Orleans route by PRJ revives the legendary Panama Limited, a historic Pullman route that was originally named to commemorate the new Panama Canal in 1911. The journey takes you through an American litany of stations Chicago, Kankakee, Memphis, Yazoo City, Jackson and New Orleans after a climactic crossing of Lake Pontchartrain. It's great to see these trains back on track connecting new generations of travelers to a less frenetic form of travel and two wonderful cities to visit.
Trips depart at 8p.m. each Thursday from Chicago's Union Station, arriving at New Orleans' Union Station at 3:45 p.m. Friday. The Chicago-bound train leaves New Orleans at 1:45 p.m. Sunday and arrives in Chicago at 9 a.m. Monday.
PRJ has only been on the rails for a little more than a year, but the work in restoring the historic Pullman carriages is taking considerably longer and it's really just beginning. In the autumn of 2015, PRJ will release a few more Pullman carriages when they launch a weekly New York to Chicago via Washington, D.C.
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