Chicago… And All That Jazz.

Big cities are Zachary’s thing…  He loves being around the huge buildings and life in the city.  Although, I’ve been in some big cities (LA, Paris, Rome, Houston, Athens, etc…) I haven’t really been in a city that is filled with skyscraper after skyscraper like Chicago is…

We dropped our car off in Hyde Park at a the University of Chicago (where we Couchsurfed- there will be a post on this soon), bought a 3-day public transportation pass, and headed into the city.  I wasn’t extremely stoked about seeing all the buildings, but Zach kept pointing out all of the different buildings from the windows of the ‘L’.  (Riding the ‘L’ is a cultural experience in itself).  However, once we were in the actual city and I got off the train I was in love.  Being beside these huge buildings, looking up and only seeing more building, was pretty awe-inspiring.

We went to Millennium Park and walked around that area for a while, before walking through downtown to Navy Pier and then to the Magnificent Mile.  This trip involved a lot of walking around the buildings and eating a lot of pizza.  Zach took me to the end of the peninsula that has all the museums on it and we got to see a pretty spectacular view of the city.

Navy Pier Entrance

Zachary and me downtown

Downtown

The Bean

Marina City

Millenium Park

Grant Park

Fantastic View of the Chicago Skyline

Chicago Theatre 

 I asked my fellow-bloggers for advice on where to get pizza and the greatest number of votes was for Giordano’s and we were not disappointed.  It was absolutely delicious- Zach thought it was a lot of cheese, but I loved it!  So, I want to give a HUGE shout-out and thanks to those who helped out with that!

Zachary at Giordano’s

We also went up to the top of two skyscrapers.  Of course, we had to do Sear’s Tower (Willis Tower, now).  It’s the tallest building in North America and the tallest structure I’ve ever been up.  It was pretty cool, but not my favorite thing we did, or even my favorite building that we went up.  I didn’t like that you had to wait to get to look out the window, there’s only a good view out of about half of the windows, and at one point the wait to go up was three hours!  Crazy!  However, the Skydeck was pretty cool!

Willis Tower (Sear’s Tower)

Me on the Skydeck

View from the top

My favorite building that we went up was the John Hancock Building.  It was significantly less crowded, there was not a wait to go up it and there was a great view out of every window.  In this building I really understood skyscraper I felt like I was actually sky-level.  It was such a cool experience.  Plus, we went up at night and it was really romantic to see the city (including the Sear’s Tower) all lit up.

On top of John Hancock

Chicago was a really great experience, and I highly suggest it!  Stay tuned for a post on the Art Institute of Chicago (my favorite part of Chicago)!

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