Between trips to Stan’s Donuts for cheaper than Starbuck’s coffee and various local haunts (read 5 star restaurants) we have taken in the water of the Chicago River….Gosh no, not literally but figuratively speaking. The tour guides would have you believe that we could drink the stuff. Chicago River is blue green because of a particular algae….and they have been on a century long campaign to clean up the water….yeah, right. Lake Houston is brown because it is mixed with chocolate milk, too. Then why do they tell you so much about the efforts to change the direct that the river flowed so it would not flow into Lake Michigan. Drinkable…or even swimable…questionable. But it is one of the best ways to see the architecture of the city and see how early engineering marvels have made Chicago (named by the Native Americans for a stinky onion garlic that grew wild along the marsh lands of the river) have really made this a wonderful place to visit.
After our early lunch at the Walnut Room on the 7th floor of Macy’s (previously Marshall Field’s) flagship building. Food was nothing special, the miles of Walnut panel is…along with the open atrium that has aTiffany Glass ceiling which is the largest Tiffany product in the world. The open atrium was being prepared for the 45 foot Christmas tree that will soon take center stage. This was the magic of Eddie’s childhood. It is sad, we know this store is destined to become condos or a hotel…there were so few customers in Macy’s that we feel its days are numbered. We browsed the Christmas Tree store….hoping for some of the magic to come alive, but the displays of Shiny Brite ornaments and Radko ornaments are far outnumbered by the plastic ones covered in Glitter. As we all know, glitter is forever….that stuff sticks and has a half life more than all the radioactive material you can imagine. While plastic doesn’t break….Made in China just does not have the same magic as the Shiny Brite of both of our childhoods.
Post lunch, under threading skies, we boarded the First Lady of Chicago…one of five different companies that run Chicago River Boat tours. We selected this one because it is run by the Chicago Architectural Foundation…and the docents are volunteers, that accept no tips,p (so refreshing in today’s tip happy world) but are passionate about both Chicago and her architectural history. For 90 minutes we went under the bridges and learned the history. Chicago is home to some of the tallest buildings in the world. Tallest is in Malaysia. New York, heck, Houston, has big tall boring buildings…but Chicago has worked hard to make their skyline distinctive as well as light friendly..they must have setbacks. They have quickly pivoted over the years converting unused space to housing…housing is so plentiful that even our Thursday night guide rode a bike to his home close by..so it must be affordable. Both our Thursday and Friday tours talked about the 50+ bridges that criss cross the Chicago River…and that Saturday morning the various bridges would open starting with the bridge across Michigan avenue to allow the sailboats that have summered in Lake Michigan to motor in and be placed in dry dock for the winter. There are 4 Saturdays in the Fall, four in the Spring. People gather along the riverwalk to watch the migration. George and I were among the spectators…Eddie was slept through the event…surprise.
Post boat parade, George and I took a lap of the old Chicago Tribune building. It is right there on Michigan Avenue amidst the Wrigley (like the chewing gum) building and NBC’s Rockefeller Center in Chicago building. I could not imagine why that was on George’s list. As we walked around the building there embedded into the lower portions of the building are some 149 pieces of buildings from around the world with great historical value…brought back in the early years of the Tribune by it correspondents. I thought I had missed something on the tour. George said “no”, he remember the random fact for a CSI:New York (years ago) that solution hinged on stone fragments from various locations, but could be found in one spot. This is my son who may or many not recognize your face but he will remember this cultural randomness. It was actually one of those interesting moments that is probably not in a guide book.
We crossed back over the bridge (with Crack O’Noon Eddie) for brunch overlooking Millennium Park. Complete with a huge police presence, bomb sniffing dogs. We were searched on Thursday night prior to entering the park…and the Bean is under construction, so we scratched our head. Low to no homeless ..
I have seen more at the WalMart inAtascocita than on the streets of Chicago. What gives.
Our afternoon was Hamilton at the Nederlander Theatre…once again, architectural magic..and a solid show. A $10 bill may never look the same…hi, Alexander…you don’t look like Lin Miranda at all. We exited the matinee as dusk was falling on the city. The streets were full of lots of people…theatre attendees, adults in costumes for Halloween, leftover Drag Queens from the Drag Brunch at Macys (Eddie said pass when I mentioned going), and more than just a few hundred people in traditional Palestine Keffiyeh and Palestinian flags….hummm, police presence, bombs sniffing dogs…got it…just a regular Saturday Protest Rally. So glad we got to see all the action on both sides of the river.
We concluded our day with dinner at one of Eddie’s favorite Steakhouse-Gene and Georgette’s. It is out of the downtown area by a mile or so. It has been in business since 1941 and is frozen in time..with all the furniture and fixtures very pre-mid century..,so right on trend. You know what they say, if you keep something long enough it will come back into style. Dean Martin, Sentra and Glenn Miller played in the background . Had a Godfather vibe for sure…totally expected a mobster to be holding court in the back corner. The tables were full, the staff where all Italian men that probably grew up from bus boys here. The steaks are the best, portions of everything else were huge.
Sunday we are all about the Museums and Aquariums….I give you a run down on that and our experiment with cab vs Lyft.
No comments:
Post a Comment