It's Very Unusual

The day began well. Dad drove us to the train station amid a gorgeous, dry 85-degree day. We got our tickets just fine, and the train arrived on time. Everything progressed smoothly...at first.

We were between Lindenwauld and Atco in Burlington County when we just stopped. There had been an accident on the track. The train coming in the opposite direction had hit a pedestrian! Lauren tried to find out more on her cell phone, but even listening to Burlington's police radios didn't net us more info.

Ultimately, after almost an hour's wait, the train was canceled. We ended up having to spend nearly two more hours on a bus to Atlantic City. This wasn't bad at first, either, despite my initially being upset to the point of tears. In fact, it kind of beat the train. Much of Burlington and Atlantic counties is farmland and woods, and it was really gorgeous.

It was nice until we hit the Atlantic City suburbs. Not only did the scenery get a lot less attractive, but people kept getting off on every single block! I don't know why everyone couldn't have gotten off in one place. Like it would have killed them to walk a few blocks?

We didn't get into Atlantic City until quarter of 3. We had a quick, late lunch at Ruby Tuesday's. (I had the Salmon Sliders. Lauren had Chicken Quesildilas. We both had the salad bar.) After lunch, we finally headed past Caeser's and Bally's Wild Wild West and onto the Boardwalk.

We mostly just strolled on the Boardwalk. Lauren had never been in Atlantic City before, so even that was a new experience. We rummaged through a dollar store/candy store/junk shop called Peanut World. We hit the cranes at Central Pier. Lauren didn't win anything, but I won a vinyl ball. (Accidentally, actually. I wanted to win the teddy bears in the next crane, but I put my money in the wrong machine.) We took pictures outside of Wild Wild West.

As we headed towards Trump's Taj Mahal, our vision got a lot dimmer...and not just because of the shadows of the casinos. A fine white mist had started swirling around, obscuring the tops of buildings and most of the beach. As the mist grew thicker, the crowds on the Boardwalk got thicker, too, chased off the sand by the mist and the lateness of the day. We finally decided we'd be better off away from the beach, where we could see where we were going.

The Outlets were our next stop. In an attempt to bring people to Atlantic City for a reason other than gambling (and clean up the entrance area around the AC Expressway), the city started building a series of outlet stores for high-end chain shops and restaraunts. The last time I saw them was in the winter of 2005, right before I moved. The IHOP and the Borders Outlet were gone, but there were plenty of other stores. We browsed in Lane Bryant, Old Navy, and Bath and Body Works, though we never did buy anything.

Lauren saw a monitor with schedules for the trains and buses at the bus station when we arrived in Atlantic City. We returned to the bus terminal to take a look at that monitor and check to see if they'd fixed everything. They apparently had; there were no more alerts. We walked over to the Sheridan Hotel behind the outlets where the train terminal is, bought our tickets, and hopped the train back to Cherry Hill.

There were no problems at all this time. We had to wait a few minutes when we got home for Dad, who got stuck in traffic, but we passed the time playing catch with my new purple ball.

When we finally got home, I made us Scrambled Eggs with Spring Vegetables, and we had ice cream for dessert while watching more Bowery Boys movies. Tomorrow, we'll hopefully be going into Philadelphia to see Independence Hall and my favorite downtown stores.

(And here's an article about the train accident from the Courier-Post. It doesn't say a whole lot more than what we found out, but it's there.)