The Windy City

On Sunday we got on the passenger train to Chicago. It was about a 3 hour ride. Here is a phone picture of Union Station. It is a huge and historically famous train and bus station, one of the largest in the world.We made more photos as we were leaving. I will share those later on.

Our hotel was the Palmer House. Very beautiful, right in downtown.

 

 

It's beautiful Art Deco lobby was just overwhelming.

We were just a short walk from Milleneum Park.
 It was filled with lots of fun things!

 

The Bean

You can't really tell but these were fountains. Transparent bricks with water flowing down. The faces changed as I guess they were like tv screens. Children enjoyed running and splashing in these, especially when the water poured from the mouth!

 

We  joined Rob and Matthew for a concert there. It was a little cool but the atmosphere was fun!

Us reflected in the Bean!

 Under the Bean

One of our favorite parts of the trip was the Architectural Boat tour. We had an awesome tour guide who gave us an excellent history of Chicago and of the architectural stuctures. 

This was the Wrigley Building. Yes, I believe it is the gum maker! It was one of our favorites, especially draped with the flag.

 

This was the Trump Tower. Spectacular, but I like the old buildings better.

 

 

 

Old buildings repurposed into housing, evidenced by the additions of patios. 

We thoroughly enjoyed the boat tour.
Also enjoyed a sidewalk concert by Tina!!

 A water taxi, cool!

A beautiful Presbyterian Church

 Some evening photos of downtown.

We also tried Chicago pizza. We weren't just wild 

about it. I think we prefer Little Ceasar's!

 We thoroughly enjoyed hearing our nephew Rob preach at his church on Sunday night.  One evening, Rob and Matthew treated us to a delicious home cooked meal. We really enjoyed seeing their exquisitely decorated townhouse and neighborhood.

The area is called Andersonville. It was so different from downtown Chicago.

It was filled with cute shops and tons of restaurants. We just loved it!

We also loved the ice cream parlor!

We had a really great trip and visit. Another stop we made was at the Science and Technology museum. It was a very interesting place, filled with planes, trains and tons of children!

 I promise to share more 

 photos of Union Station and the museum. 

I will do that soon. Thanks for visiting. 

More Champagne-Urbana photos

One of my favorite places was the place where Meg and Charlie rented a small garden plot. It was just a great place!
 

Meg started most of her plants from seeds. Also since it's organic there are no chemicals so she planted marigolds to keep out the pests. They also put up a fence to keep out other critters.

 

 

 

This area was an herb garden..... free to other gardeners. There were all sorts of herbs and flowers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was also a walking trail. It walked out to a "prarie" and was surrounded by sculptures.

We also went to the Farmer's Market in Urbana. 

Lots of produce, flowers and hand-made crafts.

 

Another reason these particular dates were selected for our trip was that the World's second largest Corvette show was being held on the campus of  the University of Illinois. Richard is also a corvette buff, so this was another highlight for him.

These were just a few of the corvettes in the outer areas. There were hundreds, inside the paid area. Richard spent a day going through this. He loved it and it was cool to see Covettes driving all over town.

We had a great time in Champagne-Urbana. It was a really nice town, just the right size. The people seemed friendly and helpful. We loved seeing Meg and Charlie and their cute apartment. My next posts will show some of the hightlights of the Chicago part of our trip. I hope you enjoy, we did!