The Windy City

03/05/07 - 06/05/07 Chicago

After our relaxing break in the Amish country we were ready for the hustle and bustle of big city life. Especially were we ready for Chicago Blues. We checked into the House of Blues hotel in the heart of the action and dined in the their blues club restaurant that night to the fantastic sounds of a solo guitarist and then full on bottle-necking blues band - Awesome!

The next morning we headed to the museum of contemporary photography to have a nose but the work was just too contemporary for our tastes so we skipped of quickly and headed up the Magnificent Mile to check out the shops and ogle some of Chicago’s archtitecture.

Architecture sure is a buzz word in Chicago. It boasts a whole (what is the collective noun for buildings??) … hod (?) of buildings built by famous architects - Mies van der Rohe and friends. In fact the website www.Architecture.org is the Chicago Architecture Foundation. In cohorts with the City they were running a free Architecture tour of buildings on the famous Chicago Loop train so we jumped on and rounded the Loop 3 times learning all sorts about the history of what was once probably the fastest ever developing city.

To complete our Architectural experience, we also opted for Chicago’s most popular and always sold out river tour. The guide from the Chicago Architectural Foundation was very knowledgeable and funny but by the end of the day we had seen enough and learnt enough about buildings!!!

We strolled around in the sun enjoying Millennium Park and the ‘Bean’ sculpture, a truly interactive experience, where everyone finds amusement with the curved reflective surfaces, playing ‘funny mirrors’ or just admiring how the curves distort the reflected view of the skyscrapers around.
Finally we caught a train out to the trendy up-and-coming are of Bucktown (Londoners think Camden equivalent) with its boutique fashion shops and designer bars and eateries and then worked our way back to the touristy Navy Pier.

Chicago is a great city and well worth a visit. It’s certainly worthy of its nickname “The Windy City” but nothing compared to places in New Zealand!! Walking up and down the Magnificent Mile with so many Art Deco and Art Nouveau buildings feels like you are in a great place. I personally loved the Carbon and Carbide building in a shade of green with gold leaf ornamental decoration - it looks like something straight out of Gotham City; and the bars and restaurants were a good appetizer for the last stop on our tour - New York, New York.

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