Sept 10-13 Doing the Tourist Thing in Chicago

Sept  10-13



Chicago.  I honestly was not looking forward to Chicago.  I made it through NYC which was better than I expected but still there is just too much noise, too busy, too many people, too much trash, too much homelessness, too much hassle, etc.   So, I was sort of surprised at how much I enjoyed Chicago.  I’m sure a lot had to do with the limited area we explored which was primarily along the waterfront.   This area is essentially a giant park with assorted “public” spaces encompassing museums, monuments, fountains, marinas, etc. Very walkable but also good public transit and with our limited distances we wound up using the rental bike service  called  Divvy and the dedicated paths to get around.

The Bean!!

We took time to enjoy several of the top tourist destinations.   Day one was the architectural boat tour through downtown on the Chicago River. We're too tall to travel this route on our boat.  Great trip on a beautiful day.  Tour guide did a fabulous job of not just pointing out the more famous buildings we passed but also how and where it fit into Chicago’s timeline.

The tour begins

Old School buildings

The "Less is More" School of basic boxes and exoskeletons

"The Corn Cob"  -  no  straight lines school

Modern - McDonalds Apple Pie Building

Newest skyscraper - female architect - still under construction

 Next day was a road trip out to Oak Park to visit the Frank Lloyd Wright house and studio and a walking tour of a number of other houses he designed during his career.  Very interesting as he designed a number of more traditional houses when working for a firm early on.   You can see the transitions over the years as he developed his own prairie style.  

Front of FLW's house - early in his career - still pretty conservative

Two of his later design houses - more in his style

Inside of Unity Temple - his style in full effect

This was originally a more traditional English Tudor style house he designed. Fire destroyed 3rd and 4th floors so he came back late in his career and redid it with Japanese and Moorish influences 

Next day we took in the Shedd Aquarium. We did a special evening adult visit which was sort of different.   They sold adult beverages which you could carry around while looking at the fish and had a DJ Alicia spinning tunes under a tent outside for the much younger crowd. Final day was a visit to the Field Museum of Natural History.   Both the Shedd Aquarium and Field Museum were built in the 30’s and are gorgeous classic buildings.

Along with all that culture we also managed to enjoy Chicago food.   A deep dish stuffed pizza from Giordano’s, some outstanding eggplant parmesan from Tufano’s , and  great beer and food at Berghoff's – a 3^rd generation family run German restaurant.

Chicago Style Deep Dish Stuffed Pizza