Blogs from Illinois, United States, North America - page 10

The drive from Buffalo was a long and pretty boring one. You don't see many international tourists when you stop on the highway service areas here. This is one serious drive, starting with Upper New York State, than the North-West of Pennsylvania followed by crossing Ohio and Indiana to finally end in Illinois. We also drive actually pretty close to Michigan. The road follow for a while Lake Erie, but we actually never saw it! If you want to park in downtown Chicago, be ready to pay up to 65usd per night...just to park your car! Hotels in Chicago are actually relatively cheap if you compare the rates to New York, but that parking fee would kill it. So we are simply staying next to O'hare airport....and are not charged for letting our little Mustang sleep ... read more

Five days till we arrive in the Dominican Republic! We are getting so close! Everyone is packing and preparing and we are excited to get to meet one another in person. Check out our Meet The Team photos for more information on team members.... read more

We stayed outside of Chicago in Oak Brook last night, and we left early this morning to head to Maquoketa Caves State Park in Maquoketa, Iowa. It was around the time we needed to stop for a restroom that I saw a sign for Dixon, Illinois: 11 miles. If you didn't know, Dixon is the hometown of Ronald Reagan. Now, I'm not a fan of the Jelly Bean Man (one of his nicknames, apparently), but I am a fan of roadside stops. Besides, he was a President, and it's good to be exposed to different ideas and parts of American History (and it is the Fourth of July). So, we pulled off in Dixon at the childhood home of Ronald Reagan to use the bathroom. The home itself is much larger than I'd expect for a ... read more

We had tickets for the 10am Lakes & Rivers boat ride from Wendella. As a kid, I'd been on a few Wendella boat rides, but it's been years. These days, there are many competing companies that give tours of Chicago from the river, but we decided to stick with the classic this trip. We walked from our hotel (Sheraton Grand), and it was a quick walk with plenty of photo-ops (especially when we crossed over Michigan Avenue). We arrived at 9:45am with tickets in hand, and the boat left promptly at 10am (don't be late!). Our tour was a 90 minute tour. Wendella offers an architecture tour from the river that lasts 75 minutes. The lakes & rivers tour is longer and it includes a lot of the architecture tour, but not all of it. We ... read more

We drove into Greenville well after midnight not knowing where we were going to stay the night. We drove around and saw a sign to the hospital and figured their carpark would be as safe as anywhere so off we went. Four very tired Amigos, one a little battered all turned in for the night. The start of a new day, later than normal at 7:45am, but lets face we had had a big day. We got out of the hospital carpark quickly and made our way into town. We have settled for one section today instead of two to easy ourselves back into full swing. Dave and Tom rode first and I drove with my wing man, Crash Test Jeff ( he isn't taking too kindly to this nickname for some reason). Our total journey ... read more