Travel: The Grand Canyon Railway, Back in Business

Before automobiles took over, the railroad was the only way to get to the Grand Canyon, unless of course you walked or rode in on horse or donkey. In fact, the railroad—the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe—with its first run, in 1901, helped turn the Grand Canyon into a major tourist attraction. There were two daily runs between the town of Williams and the Canyon’s South Rim, and as many as six special trains might carry Presidents, kings, or movie stars to the natural wonder. However, by 1927 more people were driving their cars there, and in 1968 the train made its last trip to the Canyon, with only three passengers.

The Grand Canyon Railway (www.thetrain.com), now a National Historic Landmark, is back in business, making the same two-and-a-quarter hour journey over 65 miles of high desert plains, arroyos, and part of the largest ponderosa pine forest in the world. At least five vintage passenger cars are pulled by a restored early-twentieth-century steam engine in summer and a restored 1950s diesel locomotive the rest of the year. Last year 225,000 people decided to avoid the long auto lines at the canyon entrance and relive a bit of history. Passengers include families with children and couples young and old enjoying the romance of the journey.

The train got its new start in 1989, when a crop duster named Max Biegert and his wife, Thelma, spent $15 million to buy the tracks and the right of way. In 1990 the first trains ran between Williams and the canyon. Over the following years the Biegerts continued to buy and restore vintage locomotives and passenger cars. In March of this year the Xanterra Company, which operates many national park facilities, including those in Grand Canyon Village, bought the railway.

There are five classes of service: coach, club, first-class, vista dome, and luxury parlor car (the caboose), the last of which has plush leather club chairs and a mahogany bar. Should you get bored looking out the window, there’s plenty of action on the train. The masked Cataract Creek Gang gallops up on horseback to board and rob the train. (In the morning run from Williams, this is staged at the depot.) Marshal John B. Goodmoore (“Be good or be gone” is his motto) catches the bad guys, and singing cowboys then regale the survivors. Soft drinks and snacks are available, and if you want something stronger, you can try a Woo-Woo, a vodka drink with peach schnapps and cranberry juice. You are asked to order it by holding your arm up and pretending to pull a train whistle.

The round-trip coach fare is $65 plus tax and park admission fee (less for children); other classes cost more. Packages are also available, including overnight stays in Williams or at the canyon. There’s a Polar Express with Santa aboard in winter, and coming soon is a Sunset Limited, which will bring you to the Grand Canyon in time to view a spectacular sunset.

The 297-room Grand Canyon Railway Hotel was built in 1995 to resemble the original Fray Marcos Hotel, built in 1908. The Fray Marcos was one of many hotels that the old Santa Fe Railway built along its routes that were operated by the Fred Harvey Company and known as Harvey Houses. Outside the Williams Depot, railroad buffs may enjoy inspecting other rolling stock standing by.

Williams, which calls itself the Gateway to the Grand Canyon (www.williamschamber.com), is refurbishing other hotels, such as the Lodge on Route 66 (www.thelodgeonroute66.com), with modern furniture and fixtures. The new Wild West Junction (www.wildwestjunction.com) is a sort of Disneyland of the Old West, with a large and noteworthy collection of Old West artifacts at its Territorial Museum. Williams is also home to the Arizona State Railroad Museum.

The Grand Canyon train depot, within 200 yards of the South Rim, is one of three remaining log-and-frame depots in the country. It sits alongside the El Tovar, an Arts and Crafts–style hotel and restaurant from 1905 designed by Charles Whittlesey. You can walk along the rim and peer into that wondrous mile-deep hole in the earth, watch the light change the canyon’s colors, or indulge a squirrel looking for handouts close to the wall. You can also arrange with the railway company for a bus tour around the South Rim of the Canyon. For an aerial view, there’s Maverick Helicopters (www.maverickhelicopter.com). (The Canyon’s new glass viewing platform is on the West Rim and not easily accessible.)

There are other canyons and other trains in northern Arizona. In nearby Flagstaff, more than 100 long freight trains and two Amtrak passenger trains pass through each day. Railroad buffs have been known to spend all day on the station platform watching them. The historic depot itself serves as the city’s visitor center (www.flagstaffarizona.org) as well as an Amtrak ticket counter. For those not fond of hearing train whistles all night long, the local Holiday Inn Express provides earplugs on request.

Flagstaff got its name when a group of settlers trimmed the branches from a tall ponderosa pine and attached a flag to the top to mark the Fourth of July in 1876. The pole became a landmark for travelers heading to California. The high-altitude city drew Percival Lowell to build an observatory in 1894, and the former planet Pluto was discovered there (www.lowell.edu). The Riordan Mansion, built by early Flagstaff lumber entrepreneurs, is another outstanding example of Whittlesey’s Arts and Crafts style. (www.azstateparks.com/parks/parkhtml/riordan.html). And stop for a drink at the historic Weatherford Hotel, which looks much the same as when Zane Grey wrote Call of the Canyon there (www.weatherfordhotel.com).

Grey may have been inspired by what would later become Glen Canyon National Recreational Area, in Page, a small city on a mesa near the Utah border that began as a construction camp when the Glen Canyon Dam project began, in 1957 (www.pagelakepowelltourism.com). Lake Powell, formed by the dam, is the second largest man-made lake in North America, 186 miles long, and is named for Maj. John Wesley Powell, who explored the area in 1869. The town’s only museum is also named for Powell, and it contains—in addition to memorabilia of his epic Colorado River voyages, local history, and geology—a nifty model of a species of dinosaur that once roamed these parts (www.powellmuseum.org).

The best way to explore the breathtaking red-rock canyon formations (there are 96 canyons around the lake) is by boat. The red colors set off by the blue sky and blue-green lake create a floating magical mystery tour. Some rock formations have whimsical names, such as Cookie Jar Butte, Hamburger Rocks, and Gunsight Butte, to ease identification and thus navigation. Antelope Point Marina, the newest on Lake Powell, is a cooperative effort with the Navajo Nation, the National Park Service, and private enterprise. It is built on the largest floating concrete platform of its kind in the world and houses provisions for power and luxury houseboat rentals and a fine restaurant (www.antelopepointlakepowell.com).

And while you are in the high country, don’t go to sleep before looking upward after dark. If you come from an urban area where artificial light blots out the stars, prepare to be dazzled by what’s in the night sky. That is bling with a capital B.