Thank you for this info - I was hoping to get specific ideas of new things to try and this train trip sounds great! What other awesome things have you found in your travels? With 4 yrs of having CP, about how many trips have you taken? Where else have you gone?
Well, we've done waaayy too many long weekend trips to Orlando, but we try to do 1-2 new places a year. We stayed at Cedarbrook Lodge in Seattle and it was amazing. It was cheap, beautiful and had free, unlimited Haagen
Das ice cream in the lobby.
We went to Chicago for a long weekend and loved the double decker bus tour (and used that for getting around the city). We stayed outside the city, Ubered into the city for the day, and would Uber out in the evening.
We flew to Denver and rented a car to drive to Steamboat Springs in the fall/winter. The 3 hour car ride was absolutely gorgeous. We own a timeshare at Wyndham (that we bought for next to nothing off EBay) so we try to use that when we can. We stayed at the Wyndham Steamboat Springs and visited the hot springs, the downtown area, and ate lots of green chili lol.
We flew into Birmingham, AL and drove 4 hours to Destin, FL for a week (stayed at the Wyndham Majestic Sun). We did a day trip to New Orleans, hung out at the beach, drove up to the Blackwater River Canoe company (50 min. drive) in Alabama and did a 3-4 hour kayak trip down a crystal clear river, and ate a lot of donuts at the Donut Hole in Destin.
We flew to Houston and did a long weekend with family before driving to Galveston and going on a cruise. We stayed in a 2 bedroom suite at the Residence Inn in Houston, which was really nice. The Funeral Museum in Houston is very interesting and educational (and not creepy at all).
We've flown to Vegas a few times (my husband loves to gamble) and we usually meet up with family/friends so he can gamble with the guys and I can see the shows with the girls.
We flew into Tampa and rented a house in Dunedin. We went on a boat/paddle board tour in Clearwater, drove to Weeki Wachee and did an amazing kayak tour (saw otter, manatee, and fish/turtles), spent a day in Tarpon Springs watching the sponge boats come in, drove to Crystal River and swam with the manatees and spent the day at Busch Gardens in Tampa.
Hope that helps! I don't know if we'll qualify next year (we're cutting it close), but we've definitely had a blast!
I also heard that flight prices are supposed to go down in general to Hawaii as they plan to expand their flight schedules... I am waiting patiently as I'd love to visit Aulani 
It's very difficult to find flights roundtrip from LAX or San Diego for under $600 (I'm in Orange County but would be willing to drive the extra 30 minutes each way to SD if it meant a considerably cheaper flight than LAX) so WDW and Disney Cruises are bigger draws for us with flights half the cost.
At least if that becomes impossible Southwest has no change fees.
