Making the trip alone
If I wasn’t single would I still travel solo? Absolutely.
This may not have been my answer in the past, but a few years ago my husband passed away. My options were suddenly “solo” or “no-go”. I have since completed two train trips, and, while I traveled alone each time, it’s difficult to say that I was actually solo; I met wonderful people and colourful characters along the way.
The theme of my latest trip was the Blues. I went from Toronto to Windsor on VIA, then taxied across the river and picked up Amtrak in Detroit to ride the rails down the Blues Highway.
Solo by day
My train trip was punctuated by four very different cities: Chicago, Memphis, Jackson and New Orleans. My priority in each was to find the authentic city – the city that people live in, rather than the tourist destination. To achieve this I did a lot of meandering and chatting with locals.
Sometimes the locals are organized by the city, as they are in Chicago. Before going, I arranged for one of their volunteer Greeters and specifically requested a cyclist. As a result, I got Jeanette’s tour of Chicago. On bikes provided by the city we cycled along the lake, to Wrigley field and back through a variety of neighbourhoods – chatting the whole way.
Sometimes I had to really look for the locals. In Memphis, I had trouble finding the city that people actually live in. So, on route to the National Civil Rights Museum, I popped into an architect’s office. Not your typical tourist office but I figured they would know the city from an urban planning perspective. I got lots of information and, by chance, my new architect friend was also a foodie so I received restaurant advice as well.
Sometimes locals simply presented themselves. In Jackson, the hostess of the Old Capitol Museum happened to have time that afternoon and kindly toured me around the city after we had lunch together at the classic Mayflower Diner – yes, I had the gumbo.
