Finally, Chicago: “Almost” no more

For several years, my wife and I have referred to Chicago as our “almost vacation.”

My wife has been to the city many times between when she was at the University of Wisconsin or for work trips, but other than being in the airport long enough to make a connecting flight or get a ride to work training in Downers Grove, I had never been to the city.

So after a few years in which we had talked about going to Chicago but something came up or we wound up going somewhere else, we have finally made it to Chicago.

We took an early flight out of Boston — getting up ungodly early isn’t much fun, but next to no traffic and short lines at security make up for it — so when we got to our hotel, the room wasn’t ready.

With time to kill, we walked down to the Navy Pier.

I don’t know what various organizations in Chicago do to promote the city, but whatever they do, they need to use days like today in their materials.

Temparatures were warm, the skies were sunny and the clouds were nowhere to be found.

Five years ago, my wife had to show me a YouTube video of the London Eye to convince me it was safe to ride.

Today, I saw the Centennial Wheel and immediately wanted to go on it.

Apparently, you can teach an old dog who gets nervous too easily some new tricks. One spin isn’t as long as it is on the London Eye, but you get three spins, so that’s cool.

I would have felt shame to be in Chicago without going at least once.

As we were eating lunch, my wife said she’d be interested on going on a cruise around Lake Michigan.

Twist my arm, why don’t you.

Tucked in amongst all this is a beach, which you might be able to guess was fairly popular today, although a beach in the shadow of a city skyline is a bit unusual.

So after all that, what did we do?

We went to our hotel and checked in.

Before we even had our room, the vacation was off to a good start.

 

 

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