We knew we were close to Chicago when we noticed that the bridges were clearly marked with their clearance heights.
The architecture in the city was so varied. These are just a few of the photographs I took and it seemed that the architects had managed to make each building look so different.
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| An interesting roofline on one of the older buildings spotted on our first drive through the city |
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| View over Millenium Park from a staircase window in the |
| Art Institute |
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| A Street View |
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| Buildings surrounding and reflected in 'The Bean' |
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We stayed with some of B's friends who made us very welcome into their home - thank you C and RA. We travelled into town each morning on the Metra, taking about an hour for the journey from University Park into the centre of Chicago. Double Decker seating was a new experience.
There is plenty of plant life and insect life in the centre of the city. Islands of flowers, in the centre of roads, Millenium Park and Lurie Gardens - the local insects seem to thrive and B's shoulder was a good place to rest for this dragonfly. He was not at all alarmed by the attention he was receiving from the photographer.
The Mighty Bean - the area was crowded - we still managed to take pictures.
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| The photographer as well as the photographed! | | |
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This is one of the stained glass windows we saw when we visited the Smith Museum of Stained Glass Windows, situated on the Navy Pier. We had a meal at an Italian restaurant and before we left the pier we bought popcorn from the Garrett popcorn shop - the queue for popcorn was long, but it was well worth the wait.
We spent a whole day at the Art Institute of Chicago. As we waited in the queue to get into the museum we enjoyed the music provided by these ladies who were collecting money for a children's charity. they were talented players - I could imagine that they played professionally.
We stayed in the museum until it closed, and then spent time in the museum shop selecting souvenirs of the memorable day. In the morning we spent time in the glass paperweights gallery and there were hundreds to look at, then took a general walk around the galleries. We lunched in a gallery cafe (the food was excellent) and then spent the afternoon following the guide brochure for the twelve 'must see items' if you have only one hour ..... We found that it took far longer than one hour to get to the different parts of the gallery to see the specified items, but we managed all twelve items.
It is permitted to take photographs throughout the galleries as long as you do not use flash. Here are just three items.
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| I would give this table lamp house room |
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| One of the twelve 'must see' items - an African mask |
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| Another of the twelve items - my first view of this picture in real life - from Picasso's blue period. |
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When time came to leave Chicago and head back to Ohio, B suggested we try a meal break in Toledo. Unfortunately for our meal plans, Toledo had had to shut down all its food outlets because of a problem with the town water supply. We went to a supermarket and bought food so that we could picnic on the way back. The supermarket limited bottled water to four cases per customer - we managed .
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| B and B at the checkout. |
A couple of hours later, we were nearing home when we had to stop for this freight train to get over the crossing. When it was well on the way, another freight train came from the opposite direction.
I decided that I would take a video of the trains passing - after eight minutes my camera battery ran out of power - it seemed a good idea to video the event at the time but it is about as interesting as watching paint dry.
