Chicago, aka Chi-town, aka 'The Windy City'

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December 5th 2007

Published: December 21st 2007

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switzy

David and I

both thrilled to have our photo taken as you can tell

Saturday 24th November

Train was late as usual. Arrived at about 10-10.30am and walked from the station to Davids hotel. It was only a short walk but having to
carry my huge backpack made it feel a lot longer (I have no idea how I'm gonna lug that thing up a Peruvian mountain). David was
expecting me much earlier and so was about to go out with his buisness partner Jean-Paul. I dropped my bag off in his room and joined them on their trip to the shops. We walked around for a few hours, had lunch and returned to the hotel via the metro.
David had to work in the evening, so I caught a taxi to my hotel which was about 12 miles outside of Downtown Chicago.

Sunday 25th November

I had to walk about 3 to 4 miles to get to the nearest metro station. Then I had an hour long train ride into downtown. I arranged to meet David and a couple of his friends in a bar later in the evening.
I had a walk around the Southside of the city and took

Cloud Gate, by British artist Anish Kapoor

or, as I like to call it, 'The Bean'. Whichever you prefer.

a few photos. I walked through Millennium Park which contains a few really interesting structures. There's the Jay Pritzker Pavilion, which is a concert stage and lawn area which can accomodate a crowd of 7000. Then there's the Cloud Gate on the AT&T Plaza which has been more commonly referred to as 'The Bean'. I'm sure the artist is thrilled about that. Near to the Cloud Gate is the Crown Fountain. The fountain consists of two 50-foot glass block towers at each end of a shallow reflecting pool. Faces of Chicago citizens are projected on LED screens within the towers and water flows through a water outlet in the screen to give the illusion of water spouting from their mouths. Unfortunately it was too cold to have the water flowing whilst I was there. At night the blocks are lit up with a multitude of changing colours.

I arrived at the ESPN sports bar and David was running a bit late so I decided to grab a drink and watch the American Football game. The guy next to me was from Boston, so I chatted to him about my visit there. He told me his wife was from London

The Bean at night

but that he never wanted to visit because then he'd have to see his in-laws. 3 pints later and David turned up. We had a meal and another drink then headed back to our hotels.

Wednesday 28th November

I went to the Art Institute of Chicago in the morning and spent a couple of hours doing my compulsory culture intake. Then I went to Union Station and sorted out my Amtrak train tickets for Denver.
In the afternoon I went up Hancock Tower which I was told has a better view of the city than Sears Tower (tallest building in the US). I managed to go up at the perfect time just before sunset, so I got day and night photos of the skyline.
In the evening I met David and some of his colleges for drinks. Then we had dinner in a posh restaurant with them. I had a really good steak and shared a really weird dessert with David. It came as a small plastic tree with flashing lights and small cheesecake lollipops attached to the branches. Some of the others had an assortment of ice creams and