Blogs from Chicago, Illinois, United States, North America - page 82

Day 1Christoph Hall Tour word of the day: Masturbatorium (not sure how that one came about) Beverage of the Evening: Sierra Nevada So here we are on another tour. We have the same crew as last time (Myself, Brian, Laurie, Martin, and Edward). The Nebuchadnezzar has been getting quite a workout this year touring. 20,000 miles in 6 months. As seems to be the standard, Brian along with his girlfriend Julie, spent the days up to departure working on the bus. At 350,000 miles it's showing some battle scars but is running strong. Finding Vegoil in Minneapolis this time was a bust for the most part but we did find enough to get us to Chicago. We were in the bus for only about 10 minutes when the same old jokes surfaced. We enjoyed a breakfast ... read more

Hey! I'm in Chicago right now and the traffic is crazy! Makes you appreciate all the room and space we have back home. But the weather is fantastic: warm and not a cloud in the sky. I laugh at all of you down in Texas there in the rain! Anyways it's been pretty fun. On the first day we walked through what felt like all of downtown Chicago. Just walking and walking. My feet were sooo sore, but there were some pretty cool sights (it'll NEVER compete with New York though!) like Sears Tower, the place where they make the Chicago Tribune newspaper. Then we had lunch at the 95th floor of this huge skyscraper. The view was terrific. It's a good thing heights don't scare me too much or I would have been hyperventilating. ... read more

Mark and I just spent our One year wedding anniversary in Chicago. We had a wonderful time when we were there. It’s hard to believe it’s been a year. We arrived to Chicago on Wednesday, June 20th. After we checked into the Whitehall Hotel we spent the day wondering around and relaxing. We decided to get dressed up and headed off to Fonterra’s, a Mexican restaurant that was highly recommended. Apparently everybody else in Chicago wanted to go there and we were welcomed with a two hour wait. Well, that wasn’t going to happen. We ended up finding a little Italian restaurant where we were seated immediately and were able to sit outside. On Thursday, we decided the best way to see as much of the city was to take a bus tour. We had ... read more

After months of hustling around Chicago trying to prepare, we are finally ready to take off. We depart tonight, and after two long layovers we arrive in Jo'burg. While the preparation has been a bit hectic -- clothes down in the city, medicine in the west suburbs, items bought in November, items bought yesterday, last minute trip to the doctor -- we are very excited about the numerous firsts we are about to encounter. The trip will be our first MAJOR travel together, our first trips to Africa, our first "animals in the wild" experience, Danika's first "real" Europe trip, Brad's first time to Spain, and maybe even our first time bungee jumping, etc. With all the excitement of leaving, we are a little sad today because all of our friends from school are leaving ... read more

Hola Where do I start with Chicago. I guess I'll start by saying that it is an incredible city with incredible spunk that has really caught my attention. It is the first place in the USA I have seen that I could honestly see myself living in... okay, I could if I figured that I would live 200 years, anyway. The city is crammed full of wild architecture from all over the world from all sorts of periods. The have also made the good move of making a law stating that buildings must be so far from the sidewalk so that pedestrians can see all the wacky-but-wonderful buildings without hurting their neck. The parks here are as strange as the mismash of architecture, giving the whole city - surprisingly to me - a diverse but ... read more