Well I say a quick stroll, I tried as hard as I could to take as few photos as possible, and I still ended up with over 15 (and that doesn't include the ones at the Art Institute)...
I always love having taking the train, but unfortunately the coverage is so limited in Chicago that it's a rare occurrence. Not today! This is right after I got off the Purple Line at Howard, waiting for Red..
I could spend hours and hours on the train, gazing out the window .. I love the alternate view of the world..
In downtown now, and I exit the Redline subway..
One of my favorite places downtown (as an OCD Engineering Geek) is the corner of State and Madison, also known as: The Nexus. This is the center of North, South, East and West for the house numbers along every street in the entire city of Chicago. When an address is (for example) 3401 North California Ave, you know it's 34 blocks north of where I'm standing right now, and it will be in the same location on every single north/south street in the whole city. More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streets_and_highways_of_Chicago
The main purpose of this trip was to visit the Art Institute. Now I'm really not even a small art aficionado, but I do love going there simply because it's a great feeling to be surrounded by so much talent. I am constantly in awe of anyone with artistic talent, so seeing so much great stuff there is fantastic. This little guy was featured in a touching scene in the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off". All my Art Institute pics are here: http://buzzneon.posterous.com/art-institute
Millennium Park is a great place to visit in summer, when it's swarming with happy people. However there is something oddly beautiful about it in winter too .. it's very quiet, almost serene. I was thrilled to see that the snow isn't cleared from the splash pool between the fountains..
And of course no visit to Millennium Park would be complete without checking out the cute little Bean!
I've never been able to ice-skate, but this rink (on Michigan Ave) is quite popular indeed. I looked for Katy, but she wasn't there :)
Looking west along Washington Street:
Looking south on Wabash at Randolph. Above the road are the train tracks which make up one leg of the Loop, the stairs on the left lead up to the station platform.
While I eat Chicago hotdogs all the time, it had been well over a month since my last one .. so of course I was going to indulge! I picked this up at some no-name hot-dog place in the loop (after making sure the Vienna Beef sign was present), and it was excellent. (A Chicago hotdog consists of an all-beef frank, mustard, relish, raw onion, sport peppers, fresh tomato, a pickle and celery-salt, and it's all served on a poppy-seed bun).
Seeing the large chunks of ice floating in the river was immensely cool.. That bridge is Michigan Ave, and on the right side of the picture is upper and lower Wacker Drive. You can just see the very edge of the Wrigley Building on the left.
More ice - looking east from the Michigan Ave bridge towards the lake.
The Wrigley building sits on Michigan Ave just north of the River, and is pure concentrated awesome.
Just across the road is the Tribune Tower (a very auspicious sounding name!). The lighting wasn't the best today for photos, but trust me this is an amazing building..
I love big cities like Chicago (and New Yeak, and London, etc) where you have old and new right next door to each other .. This is the Wrigley building, with the brand new Trump Tower behind it .. There's a 90 year age difference between those two, but it works (I guess age IS just a number after all :) ).
Just before I board the train home, one last pic of the buildings along Wacker Drive (along the river) near State Street.
What a great day .. I think maybe now I'll be ready to re-join the real world on Monday :)
Cameron.
Comments [0]