Joe & Deb USA 2014: Day Twenty-Four

This morning we tried to get organised and decide how we were going to spend the rest of our time here.

On the agenda for today was a tour of The Rookery and a trip to the Field Museum. First stop though was breakfast at Tempo, recommended by the friendly and helpful Dwayne. We both ordered an omelette (3 eggs) that came with three fillings plus a side of hash browns and two thick slices of toast. I couldn’t finish my omelette and didn’t touch the toast, and apart from snacking occasionally on popcorn, have not needed anything else to eat the whole day. No such thing as a small serve here.

With stomachs bulging, we set off and second stop was to buy a three day pass for the train system. This was pretty fascinating to us banking geeks, because you have to pay $5 to buy a Ventra card, and then you load money on it. The card is like an ATM card, technically a MasterCard branded debit card, no chip but contactless. So you tap it on the turnstyle and it lets you through. We braved our first subway, which was the usual low ceilinged narrow platformed subway similar to New York, though not quite as hot and crowded. Then we changed to an L train to get to The Rookery. Wow, the L is antiquated. You would think you had gone back in time to the 70’s. Narrow wooden platforms, I have no idea how it copes with a big volume of people in rush hour, narrow stairs up and down, plus all the infrastructure looks rusted and rickety. You will remember this is the elevated train line that runs above ground, with cars underneath. As trains come and go from the station, the whole platform sways back and forth, plus you can see right through the train line to the road below. Unexpected in such a busy city, and I would say long overdue for an upgrade.

We had booked a midday tour of the rookery, which is a building here in Downtown Chicago that was built in 1888. At the time, it was one of the first high-rises (11 stories) built after the Great Chicago fire of 1871 and used very advanced techniques for the day. The skylight lobby was redecorated by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1905. It’s a very impressive building and while there are FLW influences, he didn’t overwhelm an already fabulous building with his own ideas, but managed to enhance a few things. The tour felt a quite rushed on the bits we were most interested in, which was the inside, and particularly the staircase. Only half an hour long, we spent the first 10 minutes getting the history, then went outside to a cacophony of sirens and nearby construction work, which we could easily have covered off on our own time, before heading back inside to the good bits. You can’t access the stairwell, which is the most picturesque and most photographed stairwell in all of Chicago, unless you belong in the building or are on a tour, and that part was over in about 5 minutes flat, or so it seemed. But I did manage to get some pix, though they are far from good, more by good luck than good skills. It was quite impressive, and I would have liked to have had much longer to oh and ah over it. But she gave us a good tip about the Trade building, which she said had a fabulous art deco lobby, so we headed over there once the tour was over, and wow, did it have a fabulous art deco lobby. Probably one of the most lovely examples I’ve seen in the flesh.

Once we were done there, we headed for the subway again with the target being the Field Museum, but we interrupted the trip to stop at Garrett’s Popcorn Shop. This was recommended to us by the Avis woman when we picked up the car all the way back in Buffalo, and she was spot on. We bought a small caramel pecan, and a small caramel, which of course left us with enough popcorn to feed a small army. It is VERY good and rather more-ish.

The Field Museum has the largest most complete t-rex ever discovered, which was pretty impressive, and also a pretty good Egyptian section. We spent a couple of hours there wandering the exhibits, including the Lions of Tsavo, man-eating lions that ate about 135 railway construction workers building a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in Kenya, until they were eventually shot and killed by the project leader. He later sold their skins to the Chicago museum for $5000, and they were eventually turned into the exhibit we saw today.

By now it was about 4 o’clock and I was ready to head home via a boot shop I had spotted late in the day yesterday, and J stopped at a Barnes and Noble he had earmarked by one of our train stops. J was much more successful than me and arrived home a very happy camper with a book of artwork by the guy who now does all the Airfix boxtop art. Heavy, but he has to carry it :-)

A bit colder today, even though it was fine. A perishingly cold wind, that like Wellington, affected some pockets of the city worse than others. Still wearing a t-shirt and polar fleece though and plenty warm, even in the cold wind.

Tomorrow the weather forecast is good and we are planning a river Architecture cruise, and possibly a visit to the Wills Tower, formerly the Sears tower, which is the tallest building in Chicago.

I’ve booked a three hour tour for Thursday morning of Frank Lloyd Wright’s house, studio, plus a tour of Oak Park suburb, which contains quite a number of buildings designed by him. Looking forward to that, better make sure I have fully charged batteries.