Word: zephyr
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...know, this is the prettiest railroad country in the world," says Woody Vinson, who by this time certainly should know. He is gazing over a plate of Traditional Trainman's French Toast, past the plastic yellow rose, out the window of the dining car of the California Zephyr as it leaves Salt Lake City behind and makes for the mountains. The tables are full of people ignoring their breakfast, a comment less on the quality of the food than on the galactic beauty of the scene outside. Vinson and his wife Lois are on their way home to Memphis...
...stacked cars do not run in the East, where low bridges and tunnels would slice them in half, but they are well suited to the teetering pass through the Sierra Nevadas and the run through the ruddy shadow of the Rockies. The California Zephyr route takes passengers past places they would normally miss -- like Thompson, Utah, where the presence of the train doubles the size of the town. And the Ruby Canyon, the throat-tightening Donner Pass. For additional company, there are bald eagles, elk, prairie dogs, deer springing up alongside the tracks at twilight as the car slides past...
Travelers noticed. The railroad carried 19.9 million passengers in 1984, a gain of about 5% from the previous year. Business on scenic trains like the California Zephyr, which snakes through the Rockies, has been growing about three times as fast. As a result, the railroad's revenue is covering an increasing portion of expenses. Even so, the Government picks up more than 40% of the real cost of an Amtrak traveler's ticket...
...models breezing down Giorgio Armani's glass-topped runway were having too much fun to put on the mannequin's usual mask of boredom. It was a celestial fashion parade: zephyr-light chiffon shorts worn with a billowing shirt and slightly askew man's tie; immaculately tailored jackets with saucy miniskirts; poolside playsuits that looked as if they might evaporate at any moment. The international crowd of buyers and press applauded throughout the show, the highlight of last week's spring collections in Milan, and at the end stood to cheer the creator of all these...
Pastels and magic are the main components of The Wreck of the Zephyr, written and illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg (Houghton Mifflin; $14.95). A small sailboat sits wrecked at the edge of a cliff. How did it get up there? An old salt describes the journey to a place where boats glide above the water like seagulls. Van Allsburg's dark, hypnotic illustrations follow the craft through massed clouds and starry evenings, until it crashes to earth with the surprise of a joke and the power of a folk tale...