Just blew into the Windy City - Chicago!

My train trip from Syracuse to Chicago was an overnight one which was great as it meant that I could sleep. The trains are fantastic as the seats are quite wide and the train is never full so you can get two seats to yourself! Well that was our experience so far.... of course when I boarded the train in Syracuse and was told which carriage to get on the only two seats spare where right at the front of the carriage and next to the door. Not a problem I thought, until I tried to actually get some sleep! The noise that the door makes when it is being opened and closed is quite loud but even worse the door was catching on something when closing so it didn’t actually close, allowing the full sound of the train to come in. Initially I got up a few times to close the door properly but no sooner had I closed the door then someone else would walk through it opening it again! How many people need to go to the cafe cart at 10.30 at night!! So I left it until I felt that the traffic had slowed down which it eventually did at 1am! I should have checked to see if there was a party going on in there and joined them!

The following morning I awoke to a passenger opposite me clearly having an argument with his girlfriend over his phone. He kept saying he was going to hang up if she didn’t stop yelling at him and I just kept wishing he would do what he said! Hmm.... maybe that was the problem?

I arrived in Chicago at 1030am armed with my directions to the hostel as well as the email address and phone number of the train conductor Brian. Apparently I was to call him if I wanted to know anything about Chicago and he could show me around (yeah right!). A twenty minute walk later I was checked into our hostel and promptly went to sleep for a couple of hours before heading out to explore the city.

Heidi arrived around 6pm that evening very sick and puffy eyed so after a quick meal and a shower it was off to bed where she stayed for the next two days. I spent the 1st day walking through the city and on my way to the Navy Pier, I saw “the bean” which distorts the reflection of the city, very cool! Day two poured all day long and was basically a miserable day so when I eventually did venture out, it wasn’t for long. I did however spot a Chinese takeaway so I picked up some hot and sour soup for Heidi.



Chicago street decorations - herbs and veges! So decorative.

Heidi was feeling much better by day three and ready to catch up with her Uncle Geoff and friends so we made our way over to the fancy side of the city via public transport (of course). After a cup of tea I decided to go out for a walk and leave Heidi and Geoff to catch up (Heidi was still not 100% and the trip up had worn her out). I headed for the waterfront which is named the Gold Coast and walked along the beachfront taking in the wonderful view whilst trying not to be blown away! I was joined by many joggers and even had a really cute guy stop to take my photo for me!! By the way he offered I didn’t stop him! I then walked back through the neighbourhood looking at some of the beautiful buildings and even seeing the original playboy mansion (Hugh Heffner’s house before he made it famous).


Serena takes in the Windy City sights


Chicago has a great zoo that is FREE!!! So I took a couple of hours to visit the zoo and check out all the animals. The highlight for me was seeing the meerkats!! They are soo cute and of course I kept thinging about meerkat manor. There were bears, rhino's, giraffe's. lions, gorilla's but unfortunately I did not get to see the polar bear. I even saw wallabies in the Australia section and felt like I was back home!

A black bear having a snooze

I can't remember what this animal was called but it was a cute mini version of springbok!

Get together everyone....look at the camera and smile!

One of the best ways to see the city is by one of those “hop on hop off” buses and so we decided that we would do this one day even with temperatures down at 14 degrees! Meeting Uncle Geoff at the Navy Pier one morning we bought our tickets and then headed to the top of the bus where we could get the most amount of sunshine as possible! Heading around the city we saw locations such as Oprah Winfrey's current apartment location, the old water tower that was the only building in downtown that survived the fire of 1872, right through to where the Mafia ran their operations from. I had already decided that I wanted to go the Adler Planetarium as I am quite fascinated by space and love the Star Wars movies (not Star Trek though) so I hopped off there and spent the next two hours wandering through the planetarium and watching movies in the Imax theatre. It was fascinating (particularly the display of telescopes from the first ones through to current) and I could have spent another couple of hours to go through it properly but alas it was closing time.

This face moved and smiled and then spat!

Checking out 'The Bean' at Millenium Park with the city reflection in the background

A beautiful day down at the Navy Pier

Uncle Geoff and I check out the sights on the Hop On Hop Off bus

The 'Corn on the Cobb' buildings

The John Hancock building where we had drinks on the 96th Floor

The sound shell

Chicago City skyline

Meeting Heidi at the Sears Tower (which is now called Willis Tower) we quickly walked back to our hostel, got changed and made our way back up to “the Gold Coast” to meet Uncle Geoff, Belinda, Ian, Kathy and Barry for drinks at the bar on the 86th floor of the John Hancock building. The view is spectacular and I am going to take the very brave step here of actually saying that it was better than the Empire State Building!

Uncle and Niece have a mojito together in Chicago

Leaving the bar much lighter then entering (both the hip pocket and in the head!) we went for dinner for famous Chicago deep pan pizza and headed to the House of Blues to experience some of that live blues music that Chicago is so well known for!

Serena enjoys the famous Chicago Deep Pan Pizza

The Blues Bar at the Chicago House of Blues

Uncle Geoff and I listen to some Old School Blues

Upon entering I headed to the bar (what else would I do!) and before I had even ordered our drinks I was approached by a man wearing his cap backwards and trying to be very cool! Being polite I chatted with him and even shared a few laughs. I don’t know what it is but Americans tend to think that we are from England first and when we say no the next guess is always Ireland??? What the? So after I explained that I was from Australia, I headed back to Heidi to enjoy the blues music. After a few minutes “cap backwards man” came over to have a chat and try to entice me to a dance. Well after watching him dance there was no way that I wanted to get up there and have him try to slow dance with me! So I convinced him and Belinda to get up and have a boogie which they did! It is important to note that “cap backwards man” was 47 yrs old so this did mean that I set a new low record and the age of men asking me to dance had decreased from 60+ to 47!! Not something that I would generally be proud of but in this case it was something worth noting!

Excited about our flight to Miami the following day and the prospect of warmer weather, we had a reasonably early night, said goodbye to Uncle Geoff and friends and headed home.