The closest station to me is in Cincinatti, OH. Looking at the map it would probably take at least 3 trains to get to Atlanta. Then wherever we go from there.
I can either go East to the DC area then down south or I can go NW to Chicago then down to New Orleans and back NE to Atlanta.
I suppose that brings me to another question -
This trip I got a buss ride from Cincinatti to get me closer to home. The train dropped me off around 3:30am and my buss left at around 12:30pm. So I had 9 hours to kill. I was going to get a ride from a family member and hang out with that side of the family from 8:30-10:30, that way I wasn't tying anyone up in the wee hours of the morning, but the Cincinatti train station apparently "closed" at 4am? So I ended up laying down on the sidewalk in front of the train station. Luckily, who I got a ride from was still awake at 4am and I was able to straighten things out... However, the experience tells me that train stations (maybe some of them are) are not like airports where the terminals are open 24/7. So if I have 3 train schedules to follow and have a day or so layover it isn't likely I can stay at the train station. I'd rather not add the expense of hotels for a few nights during the trip but maybe there aren't any good ways around it?