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beige_alertI spent the day in Chicago, wandering. It's been way too long since the last time I did that. Amtrak will take one between the station in Milwaukee and Union Station in Chicago in a bit over an hour and a half for $20 each way. It's a nice ride, in a spacious and quiet train. They even have electricity, standard mains sockets along the wall by each seat. Handy for iPod recharging. Maybe someday we'll have WiFi like our European friends. For now, just having some means of travel besides driving is nice.
I wandered through Millennium Park. The "bean" is cool, an oddly-shaped highly polished unit of art. The curvy bridge is neat. I think I have been near Buckingham Fountain before, but it's been a long time. I went to the Hancock Center's observation deck, on the 94th floor at 314 meters. Quite a view. You get to look way, way down onto the rooftops of buildings that would be towering skyscrapers in a shorter city, such as Milwaukee. (The tallest building in Milwaukee is the 42 floor 183 meter US Bank building, which I just learned while looking up the height was, like the Hancock and the Sears Tower, one of Fazlur Kahn's designs.) There is a section with mesh to let you feel the breezes and hear the noise of the rooftop air conditioning equipment on the neighboring buildings. I even found a gift in the gift shop. You'll know if I got it for you.
I had forgotten that there was a Moonstruck Chocolate shop in Chicago, but I walked by it and stopped in for a chocolate milkshake.
It is fun just wandering around. Milwaukee is gradually turning into a place where things happen and people live and you can find people walking about other than me, but Chicago is in a whole different category. I think even the New Yorkers and the Londoners will have to admit that Chicago is a Real City (TM), too. I like Milwaukee, I really do, but if you live in, say, London, England, and are not thinking "golly, on my next vacation I really want to visit Milwaukee, Wisconsin," I can totally understand why.
I am planning some museum visits in the near future.
I wandered through Millennium Park. The "bean" is cool, an oddly-shaped highly polished unit of art. The curvy bridge is neat. I think I have been near Buckingham Fountain before, but it's been a long time. I went to the Hancock Center's observation deck, on the 94th floor at 314 meters. Quite a view. You get to look way, way down onto the rooftops of buildings that would be towering skyscrapers in a shorter city, such as Milwaukee. (The tallest building in Milwaukee is the 42 floor 183 meter US Bank building, which I just learned while looking up the height was, like the Hancock and the Sears Tower, one of Fazlur Kahn's designs.) There is a section with mesh to let you feel the breezes and hear the noise of the rooftop air conditioning equipment on the neighboring buildings. I even found a gift in the gift shop. You'll know if I got it for you.
I had forgotten that there was a Moonstruck Chocolate shop in Chicago, but I walked by it and stopped in for a chocolate milkshake.
It is fun just wandering around. Milwaukee is gradually turning into a place where things happen and people live and you can find people walking about other than me, but Chicago is in a whole different category. I think even the New Yorkers and the Londoners will have to admit that Chicago is a Real City (TM), too. I like Milwaukee, I really do, but if you live in, say, London, England, and are not thinking "golly, on my next vacation I really want to visit Milwaukee, Wisconsin," I can totally understand why.
I am planning some museum visits in the near future.
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Date: 2006-06-18 03:56 am (UTC)