August 19, 2012

We got up at early this morning and walked about 1/4 a mile to the train station across the road from the campground.  This used to be a regular stop years ago, but now it is a flag stop.  The train will only stop when there is a rider there and a flashing light signal is activated.  The train left the Beverly Shores stop at 7:45am.  We rode it to the last stop in Chicago – the Randolph Millennium stop.  We arrived at 9:15 am.  The train ride took us through Gary, Indiana and East Chicago, Illinois.

After hitting the streets in Chicago we walked a block to Millennium Park. There is a great stage in the center for entertainment.  They were having a piano concert at 6:00 tonight.  We were told not to miss “The Bean”.  This is a three story high polished stainless steel sculpture named “Cloud Gate”.  It reflects and distorts everything around it including spectators, the Chicago skyline, and the sky.  There is also the Crown Fountain that had lots of children playing in it.  It had a two 50 foot tall glass brick towers facing each other with a black granite reflecting pool between them.  Both towers had LED videos showing faces and at times water spurted out of them onto the spectators.

We walked across the BP bridge to get across the freeway.  The trail beyond took us to the lake shore and then we continued to walk to the Navy Pier.  We walked over a bridge spanning the Chicago River which had great views of the city buildings.  At the entrance of Navy Pier was a statue of Bob Newhart in a chair and a couch next to him.  We walked to the end of the pier and had a burger and beer at the Landshark Beer Garden.  A Navy band was playing a rock and roll concert.  There were eight people in the band all dressed in their white Navy uniforms.  They were really, really good.  At the end of the pier was a Navy Frigate that was open for tours.  The Navy was celebrating the bicentennial of the War of 1812.  The line was really long and last fall we toured one of them in Boston so we skipped this one.  Inside the building on the pier is a large collection of stained glass windows, many of them made by Tiffany.  There was also an air show going on today and we watched planes fly over Chicago all day.  The sound of the jets vibrating off all the building when they went over was really something to hear.  They were very loud and once we even heard a sonic boom.

Then we went into Miller’s Pub where Jim had a beer and I had two glasses of iced tea.  This bar has been here since 1935 and had pictures of celebrities on the wall.  Among them were Jerry Lewis, Jack Benny, Lee Meriweather, Margaret Hamilton, Marilyn Monroe, and Jimmy Durante.  We took pictures of the elevated train on State Street then walked back to the commuter train station and got on the 4:40 pm train back to Beverly Shores.  It arrived at 6:20 pm and walked back to camp.  We talked to the couple with the Scamp and then drove to Shoreline Brewery for dinner.  They had pitchers of beer for $7.00 tonight,