Nate’s birthday was recently, and he decided he wanted to take the train to Chicago for a weekend! We went to Chicago a few years ago and had a great time, but knew there were things we didn’t get to that we definitely wanted to. Last time, I bought a CityPass, which I loved. You can choose how many places you think you will go to and you pay one flat rate for the CityPass instead of paying individually to get into each place. We got the one that you could go up to 5 different places, and the pass is good for 9 days from the first day you use it. When I did the math, you had to go to at least 3 places for it to be “worth it”, and anywhere you go after that would be “free”. Shedd Aquarium and the Skydeck were 2 that are included, and then there is a list of 8 to 10 other places you can choose from to get to your 5 activities. The first time, this worked really well for us. I didn’t buy one this time because there were only 3 places on the list we wanted to go to, and we only ended up going to 2 of them.
We planned on taking the train (Amtrak) to get there, and we were going to leave at 10:30am on Friday. They called that morning saying that our train had been cancelled due to technical reasons, and they would provide a bus for us to get there. At first, Nate was mad that cancelled the train. Half the fun of travelling is the journey, not the destination. He also thought they were going to put us on a crappy bus. While we did start a little later than anticipated, the bus they got for us was actually quite nice, and it was nice to not have to stop to let other passengers on and off (we took Amtrak last time we went, too).
We made it to the city with no other issues, and I even got a little sleep on the bus. We stayed at The Drake this time, so we went to the hotel to check in, drop our stuff off and change. From there, we walked to Devil Dawgs, and stopped at Patagonia on the way (Nate didn’t bring a coat). He got a classic Chicago dog and I made the mistake of getting a Coney dog. Don’t get me wrong, it was good, but they had other things on the menu that I would have loved to try if I hadn’t panicked 😅 From there, we got an Uber and headed to Shedd Aquarium. We went to Shedd last time we were there, but I’m a sucker for anything animal related. I really wanted to do some sort of animal encounter, but by the time I learned that they did them, they were booked out until mid-March. It sounds like we might be going back in April, and if we do, that will definitely be on the to-do list. We walked around the aquarium until they closed at 5, but our dinner reservations weren’t until 8, so we decided to go to Chinatown for a little bit. This was a new experience for me, and it was cool! They have really neat architecture. We ended up stopping to get some appetizers at Triple Crown Restaurant, which was delicious. From there, we went to Logan Arcade for about an hour, where I actually won a game of pinball against Nate! We went to this place this time because Nate has a coworker that has a pinball trophy on the wall and suggested we stop, but we actually were also here the first time we came to Chicago because it was close to the restaurant we ate at. This time, we had reservations at Osteria Langhe. They are an Italian restaurant, apparently known for their Plin. They have an interesting menu that I really liked, because it seemed like everything was meant to be shared. We got one app, which I cannot for the life of me remember what it was. From the first course list, we got the plin, which is kind of like a mini cheese filled pasta with an amazing butter sauce (seriously, try the plin!), and ragu. For the last course, we ordered the Coniglio, which is a prosciutto wrapped rabbit loin with mushrooms and polenta. All the food here was delicious, and the atmosphere was a little more upscale but still fun. I feel like I need to add for science, I don’t typically eavesdrop on strangers conversations, but the tables were pretty close together, and at first I thought the people next to us were siblings, and this woman was kind of acting like she wanted to get into an argument with the man she was with. But then they started holding hands and it was weird, so then I thought maybe they were on a date, but then the woman referred to her husband at one point, so obviously we talked about that after they left (don’t cheat on your spouse, people 😒). After our delicious meal, we got a ride back to the hotel and watched a movie until we fell asleep.
The next day was Nate’s actual birthday, and I had gotten us tickets to go to the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry. He really wanted to the U-505 Submarine tour, so I got us tickets to that as well. I had scheduled that for 10:15 (they recommended getting there 30 minutes early to go through the WWII exhibit first, and even though I’m not nearly the history buff he is, I really enjoyed it. We got to walk through the only German Submarine to make it to America and hear about how they lived with 59 men on it for 3 months from a really enthusiastic tour guide. Once we left the WWII section, I think we spent an additional 2 to 3 hours exploring the rest of the museum and didn’t see everything. We went through the natural science part, and saw a Tesla battery, a tsunami exhibit, a tornado exhibit, an avalanche exhibit, and a renewable resource exhibit (particularly wind generators, which I am OBSESSED with). They had a section about the human body similar to Body Worlds (we saw in Houston in the early 2020’s), and a big section that we really liked that was intended to be about trains. It was a huge diorama, with trains going from Chicago, through the mountains of the western USA to Seattle, and back through the farmlands of the tornado belt back to Chicago. This was the last thing we did before we left, as it was well into the afternoon and we hadn’t eaten anything yet. We went to Lou Malnati’s for some Chicago style pizza. We get them delivered frozen at home sometimes so it was cool to go to the actual restaurant. It is a cute place, with brick walls and an underground industrial feel. Our pizza was delicious, and we realized the frozen pizzas we get at home from them don’t taste much different, and I love consistency 👏 from there, we walked to Goodman Theatre, were Nate had gotten us tickets for a magic show. It actually ended up being beneath the Goodman Theatre, and totally not what we were expecting when you hear “Magic Show”. It was a very intimate setting, with probably about 50 people in the audience. Seating was set up for each group, and since it was just Nate and I, we were in the front row. One of the first things he did was rip up a dollar bill from someone in the audience and make it whole again, after he wrote down the serial number from that bill. This is important, since it also came back at the end of the show. Nate did get picked to help assist with a card trick, ironically with another guy who also happened to be there celebrating his birthday. There was another trick he did where he took 3 wedding rings from men in the crowd and connected them all together, and then separated them all. The whole show lasted a little over an hour, and it might have been the highlight of our trip. After the magic show, we went to dinner at 312 Fish Market for Sushi. This was really interesting, because it is actually a restaurant in a food court of a Chinese market. We actually had a hard time finding it, since it was actually upstairs and the main floor of this building had a few different restaurants as well. It was well worth it, though. The fish was delicious! Afterwards, we went back to the hotel for the night to relax for a bit and watch another movie. We wanted to try out the bar in the hotel, but it was full when we went down there.
On our last day, we took our time in the morning getting ready to leave and packing our things. Our train was set to leave at 2:15pm. We left the hotel around 11 and Ubered to the train station, and then we walked to Luke’s Italian Beef for lunch. Nate got a dipped Italian beef sandwich and I got a chicken parm sandwich, and we split them. Nate’s sandwich was waaay better than mine, for the record. Then we walked back to Union Station, and ordered bloody mary’s to sip while we waited for the train. They were good, but our train ended up getting canceled 15 minutes before it was time to leave. They got us another bus to get home, so that put us back about 30 minutes. This bus was more comfortable than the one on the way here, and I wasn’t able to sleep on this one (I kept hearing myself snoring and waking up 😅). We got home around 9pm (we stopped to get Taco bell for dinner), and our dogs were very excited to see us, as always.
Overall, we had a great trip! We did just enough that we weren’t bored, but not so much that we were limiting our time anywhere. We had some amazing food, and had a little time to relax, too. The hotel was really cool; older style with lots of personality, but didn’t feel grossly outdated, either, if you know what I mean. Last time, we stayed at a studio apartment Airbnb, and while it was nice, it had the worst water pressure ever, which is horrible for washing long, thick hair like mine. Last time we were there, we went to the Field Museum, which was okay, but if you have to choose between that and the Griffin Museum, I would choose Griffin. I kind of thought it would be something I wouldn’t be interested in, since I’m not really into industrial history, but I really enjoyed it. Even before visiting this, the Field Museum was not my favorite natural history museum we have been to. Don’t get me wrong, they have a cool dinosaur exhibit and such, but I felt it had a weird layout and besides the dinosaurs and gemstones, it just wasn’t very exciting. Nate and I are both sad that we didn’t actually get to take the train, but given how cold it was and some videos I saw in an Amtrak group I’m in on Facebook, I think the bus was the way to go this time. I think Chicago is a great weekend trip, no matter how you get there. There are plenty of things to do, and who knows, maybe next time we go it won’t be cold and snowy so we can experience it in a whole new way!
Leave a Reply