Back Home Again in Indiana
We're ba-a-a-a-ck! Returned to Fort Wayne at 4 pm this afternoon - had a nice, long-overdue break from the real world, and just went with the flow of things.
We arrived at 11 am on Saturday and dropped our luggage at the Palmer House (couldn't check in until 3 pm), and set out in search of some lunch. We enjoyed some awesome pizza burgers and deep-dish Chicago-style pizza at Exchequere, a nice little tavern near our hotel. We were all on our own until our time to meet for our cruise at 6:15. Several of us decided to take a double-decker bus tour that was available. For $25 apiece, you can ride the tour bus around the greater downtown area with unlimited "hop-on's/hop-off's". The tour guides were informative and witty, and we laughed as we learned. This is supposedly a statue of Sigmund Freud that hangs from atop this building:
And here's a fountain that my fellow fans of the TV show "Married With Childen" may recognize from that show's opening credits:
At 6:15 we boarded our respective buses and headed out for our adventure on the lake. This was our vessel du jour, The Spirit of Chicago:
We boarded here at the Navy Pier, which we had visited earlier in the day during our bus tour. Here I am on some sort of large spinning wheel created by a guy named George Ferris:
The "Spirit" didn't really go out in the lake very far, but most of us landlubbers had to get acclimated to the motion regardless. We set sail just before we were served dinner! Fortunately that turned out fine, despite many early complaints of dizziness that were eventually calmed by alcohol. A few shots from the deck:
We enjoyed the fireworks from our vantage point near the Navy Pier before it was time to head back to our rooms for the night:
We called it an "early night" at 1:30 am (our time) so we could enjoy some sleep and a nice breakfast before catching our return ride home at 10:15.
This was our weekend spent apart from our daughters since April of 2004; it was long overdue. I think we'll try to do these sort of things more often!
posted by John Good @ 8:25 PM
5 Comments:
I'm so glad you had a good time! I didn't catch your e-mail until late...and didn't have time to respond. There is so much to do in Chicago, it's easy to find whatever you want without much trouble. I kind of like to hang out at the Blue's clubs. You can easily spend a week in Chicago and find something different to do every day. I wish the weather was better for you, though.
Next time you are coming out this way, give me a heads up in advance so we can get together. Sorry, I read your e-mail so late!!
The pizza is pretty great here, eh? There was a place called "Gullivers" near Loyola University during the college years. They had great pizza there, too...pan pizza. It was a small place, but the food was outstanding. I think it may still be there, not too far off Lake Shore Drive.
Mary Ellen - MY bad for waiting til so late - I'll let you know sooner next time. We pass through several times per year, but are generally in a hurry to get somewhere else and worried about getting stuck on the interstates. . .
I have a MUCH more positive impression of Chicago now! =)
I'm glad you had a great time on your visit to the windy city.
When I left downtown was really not that great at night. The streets were pretty much deserted after nine and not really safe to be out alone on.
I'm glad they have brought back some of the glory the downtown area was well known for in the sixties though and earlier.
Take care and ...
God Bless.
Glad you had a great time. But you do know that sea sickness is all in the head right? Married With Children? I loved that show! I started watching it with the buddies when I was stationed in Cali. We would all sit around in the room and drink beer that night as we tuned in for that and 21 Jump Street.
Cool pics! Thanks for sharing your mini vacation with us!
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