Scenes from the Windy City

So we have found out first hand that Chicago is indeed the THE windy city.  Big storm a couple days ago that other people seemed to know more about across the country than we did here.  Just thunder, lightning and a lot of water on the street where we are staying.  But the next two days have been very windy - so windy that Sam and I got blown across a street, Sam tumbling in the middle, me unable to stop or get back to him.  That was a big gust - never experienced having my body moving like that without my consent before.  Luckily we were crossing with the crosswalk light so no cars were coming.

This was just a light breeze compared to later.

We walked by Wrigley Field.

 Sorry, a bit out of order here.

But first Lake Michigan from the Indiana dunes.

Chicago is on the horizon - you could see it with binoculars.

 

We went to the Art Institute of Chicago Art Museum.  We have a board game called Masterpiece where you have famous works of art and value cards and you see who ends up with the most millions in the end.  That's the briefest outline of the game.  All the works of art in the game are from this museum.  We've been planning to come here for months.  The game has about 25 paintings so we tried to see as many as we could.  One wing of the gallery was closed and some things like the Picasso and the Monet are on loan.  But we saw about 15 of them and it was a great thrill.  There was a whole room of Monet paintings which was just wonderful.  Sam took pictures of all the paintings he knew but flashes weren't allowed so it was a struggle.  They are mostly a little blurry - he tried and tried to get them clear. 

The Renoir

The Van Gogh

Grant Wood

Winslow Homer

There is a huge collection of miniature rooms at the museum.  A Chicago woman, with means, sponsored them and they are amazing.  She had a team of people that made the rugs, the furniture, etc. for her.  The scale is one inch for each foot.

We spent 3 hours at the museum.  When we left we found that Hollywood was on site filming a scene for The Vow.  We sat and watched the 'action' for a while.  Several people running down a walk way - walking back, running down again, walking back with large gaps of time in between.  Then later after we'd explored Millenium Park we saw them still filming it but this time with the leads either in costume or perhaps the first people we saw were stand ins.

We are having fun traveling on the El - the elevated train/subway.  There are subways as well but mostly we're above the street with a great view of everything we are passing and the buildings of the city.

The view of the street from the train station.

Four tracks wide.  The two middle ones are for through trains and go down and become subways.

Rumbling along over traffic.  It is really, really, loud.

Looking west from downtown - the blur in the middle is a train passing by.

The next day we went to the Field Museum of Natural History - in the same general area as the art museum.  We saw the exhibit on gold that's been traveling around the country for the last few years - in fact we saw it in New York three years ago.  But it was good to see it again and Sam got to hold a one ounce gold coin worth over $1300.  There was a museum volunteer in the exhibit and he started visiting with Sam and walked around with us explaining various things.  Sam is worth about 1.5 million in his weight in gold.  No pictures allowed in the gold exhibit. 

Outside the museum.

After the natural history museum we walked up the waterfront and ended up in Grant Park - where Barak Obama was on election night.  There was no one in the park when we were there, quite a contrast to that night two years ago. 

Grant Park.

 

The waterfront with a breakwater. 

 

A large ship that will have to go all the way around Michigan if it wants to leave the Great Lakes.

 

 

The Shedd Aquarium.   

We went to the Aquarium - I think it might be the nicest I've ever been in.  They have a huge pool where they put on shows with Baluga Whales and Dolphins.  It is right on the water so you look from the pool directly to the lake - it almost looks continuous.  They have a wonderful central tank - huge - of Carribean fish and a huge sea turtle.  There was a diver in with them, feeding them, and hand feeding a ray - their mouths are basically on their bellies.  They have an Anaconda.  Yup.  Big snake.  Really big snake.  Could see its body hanging out under the water - about a foot thick.  Or more.  And really long.  They get up to 26 feet long.  And they can go fast.  And have been found with a 6 foot lizard inside.  The head is remarkably small but we know those jaws can open really wide.  It was astonishing.  There was a really great octopus too - all of the glass of the tank right in front of us.  Little suction cups all the way to the very tip of each tentacle. 

We visited Millenium Park.  A lot of weird, metallic sculpture.

People call it 'The Bean'.  It's huge and shiny and reflective.

Sam and his reflection in the bean.

A huge sculpture over the top an outdoor performing space.

A strange bridge design over the highway.

Looking straight up from under the center of the bean.

And peaking out from under it.  Made me sort of nauseous. 

Much colder in Chicago today - should be freezing tonight.  We hope to be on our way tomorrow - heading south and hope to see the great Mississippi soon.