Amtrak

We've never been on a trip before, we booked a roomette to Tucson once before, but missed our train because an employee looked at our ticket and told us to sit and wait for him to call us. He never did and our train left, then he was very rude, convinced us to cancel our ticket (which was the wrong advice). It's a long story, needless to say, we got our money back, plus repayment for last minute flights (we needed to be in Tucson), plus this voucher for another trip.

The trip can be any time of the year next year, not February, March or April. Assuming summer is best?

The plan is to ride out west somewhere, California? And then rent a car to road trip home. It'll be the first and probably only time we can afford something like this, so we wanna make it count. It might make more sense to drive out and train back? But... I worry about missing the train... Again.. no no, we're leaving from Chicago.

I know some routes are better than others, and I know they change sometimes, what they're offering, what they used to offer, etc.

We'd like a roomette, and we wanna see the sights in one of those glass roof cars, and I know the food options vary too, so whatever the better of the food options would be ideal.

Bonus points if you have suggestions of things to check out on our way back east. We've never been out west before, besides Tuscon. Maybe see the Sequoias? Grand canyon? We like backpacking so the return trip will probably involve some car camping, or real camping, for the fun of it.

Thanks!