DAY 1
Hi Mum, it’s 3 p.m. and we’re leaving Penn Station in New York. Our train is called the “Crescent”. It’s fantastic and incredibly long. It’s got a restaurant car and there are TVs in the compartments. Just before dinner we stop in Washington DC, the federal capital. The American President lives and works here in the White House. DC stands for District of Columbia. After dinner we continue travelling through Virginia.
I’ll write you tomorrow!
Kisses,
July.
DAY 2
Hi Mum!
When we wake up we’re in Georgia. It’s a poor state and a lot of people live in trailers. Trailers are enormous caravans without wheels. The train stops again in the state capital Atlanta, which is famous as the home of Coca-Cola. It’s midday and we are in Alabama, another poor state with lots of trailers. There are a lot of forests and hills. We pass through the state capital Birmingham, the site of race riots in the 1960s. we arrive in New Orleans, the state capital of Louisiana, at 2.30 pm. Here we have to change trains. Our train is the Sunset Limited – the train that runs from Orlando in Florida to Los Angeles. This train is ever bigger and more luxurious than the Crescent. I’ve never seen a train like this before. There’s a restaurant and an observation compartment with glass walls and a ceiling. In the evening they show movies. Louisiana is full of swamps and lakes, with no signs of human habitation. Then at about 6 p.m. everything changes: we’re in Texas. The first things we see are dirty factories and abandoned oil rigs. At 10 p.m. we arrive in Houston, home of NASA and the oil industry. It’s the fourth richest city in the world.
I’ll write you tomorrow.
Bye
July
DAY 3
Hi!
I have few time to write today!
We’re still in Texas, but we haven’t seen a single cowboy or a cactus. Everything is so flat and the scenery is really boring. During the night we leave Texas and enter New Mexico and then Arizona.
The moon is shining and in the desert we see the typical vegetation of these two states – the cactus.
Kisses,
July
DAY 4
Hi mum!!!
When we wake up we are on the periphery of Los Angeles, California. The train travels through the poorest parts of this city where Hispanic immigrants live. We arrive in Los Angeles Station at 11 a.m. It’s the end of our train journey. We’ve travelled 5.000 km and we’ve changed the time on our watches three times. (it’s now 2 p.m. in New York) what a fantastic way to see America! Tomorrow we’re visiting some Hollywood film studious and then unfortunately we’re flying back to England.
See you tomorrow!!!
Kisses
July