Texas Eagle (Amtrak)

Texas has two trains - the Texas Eagle (San Antonio to Chicago) and the Heartland Flyer (Ft Worth to Oklahoma City.) The Texas Eagle connects to the Sunset Limited (Los Angeles to New Orleans) three times a week to give service from Los Angeles to Chicago via Texas. 

I used to ride the Texas Eagle from Dallas to Bloomington/Normal, Illinois when I was working in Peoria, because I got tired of getting up at 4am to catch a plane to Chicago and then connect to Peoria. On the train, I would board on Sunday afternoon, sleep on the train, shave in St Louis during a refueling stop and get to the office by 1pm. 

My son and I took the train from Dallas to Los Angeles just for the trip - and the chance to ride through D'Hanis (my Mom's hometown) on the train - which is only for the dedicated, because it was at about 5am.) It is a long ride from San Antonio to El Paso. 

Virginia wants to take the train to Alpine for the ride down to Big Bend, but we have to find a rental car company that will deliver to the train (there is at least one.) Taking Amtrak across the State of Texas is the only way to make driving look reasonable. 

According to the latest timetable, going eastbound (and northbound), you enter Texas in El Paso at 3:45pm in the afternoon and you leave Texas in Texarkana at 8:41pm the next day.