This morning we slept in. After the 10 hour drive from Pittsburgh, including the 5 hour drive across Indiana, and the 6 am wake-up time, I feel like we kind of deserved it!
Once we got up and moving, we asked our very nice, and extremely helpful Innkeep whether we could get a train into the city. Turns out, yes! There is a train station about 10 minutes down the road from our Inn, so we drove the car down there. Weirdly enough, there is no all-day parking near the train station (at least, not on Sundays) but we asked an employee, and he confided to us his super-secret free parking spot on a side street a block away.
We got on the Blue Line at Jefferson Park and rode it into the city. We decided to get off at the Park/Lake stop because I had hoped to ride the Loop, but we couldn't quite figure out which train was the elevated one (turns out all of them, but we were unaware at the time) so instead, we wandered out and discovered the theatre district.
At this point, we were getting pretty hungry, so we sought out delicious pizza from Uno's. And it was delicious indeed! Mmm, deep dish cheese pizza from the home of deep dish pizza. Om nom nom. I really liked the sauce they used and thought it was pretty cool that the sauce was spread on top of the cheese instead of underneath. Different and delicious.
After a very satisfying late lunch, we headed down the Magnificent Mile towards Millennium Park in order to see The Bean!
For those not in the know, the Bean is the nickname for a giant metallic sculpture called the Cloud Gate. It is fascinating watching the city and the people being reflected in the surface of the statue.
The park is right near Lake Michigan and the cool breeze coming off the water was an irresistible draw on such a hot day, so we decided to stroll along the wharf towards the Aquarium and the Planetarium. It was a lovely stroll and we got a snow cone and some lemonade along the way. By this time, the sun was starting to set, so we decided to head back, but we needed to find a train stop first.
After a little hiccup where we mistook the Metra for the CTA trains, we found a Red Line stop and rode it to the transfer with the Blue Line. Tom was pretty much done, but he was nice enough to indulge me in one last stop at Logan Park.
What's in Logan Park? The neighborhood of one of my favorite comic artists, Lucy Knisley. She lives in Chicago at the moment, but she is moving back to New York and so she made a comic all about her favorite places in her neighborhood. I guess it makes me a crazy stalker fan, but I was so grabbed by her honest love for the place that I really wanted to see it for myself. So, we went to her favorite local coffee place to give it a try.
Is that weird? Yeah, that's weird. Oh well!
Tomorrow we head to Wisconsin to see Aunt Patti and Uncle Les. Onward to the dairy state!
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