Day Four in Chicago 2014: Not Millionaire's Row

We have breakfast on the roof top lounge again ... what shall we do today? 

We decide to further explore the Magnificent Mile on North Michigan Ave. For some reason, I keep thinking of it as "Millionaire's Row" ... which makes no sense whatsoever. Before I came to Chicago I thought it was actually a neighborhood of Gilded Age mansions. Not so ... just a lot of very attractive retail for people who love to shop.

In the middle of this district is the Historic Water Tower on North Michigan Ave. It's an odd faux castle-like structure that now sometimes features art exhibits. While we were there we saw a photographic exhibit entitled New Deal Utopias by Jason Reblando: 

During the Great Depression, the U.S. government built three planned communities of Greenbelt, Maryland; Greenhills, Ohio; and Greendale, Wisconsin. In photographing these "Greenbelt Towns", Reblando explores the New Deal vision to resettle displaced farmers and poor urban dwellers in model cities which unified the best elements of "town" and country."

On the Magnificent Mile

Two cool dudes on North Michigan

Then some serious shopping ...  All Saints and Zara for R and J, Garrett Popcorn Shops, 625 North Michigan Avenue, for that famous Chicago mix popcorn and on to Eataly for lunch. Ravioli, spaghetti and tagliatelle!

Eataly Chicago

Off to the airport in the late afternoon ... ciao ciao Chicago. Till we meet again.

Day Three in Chicago 2014: Chasing the Little Goat

R at The Little Goat

My sister-in-law kept urging us to have breakfast at a place called The Little Goat, 820 W. Randolph St., in the West Loop, a place she visited when she was last in Chicago. We oblige. Delicious! The breakfast is awesome, plentiful and the locale is bright, cheerful and friendly. I embarrass the husband by asking our server if she is Italian as she has an Italian surname.

The Little Goat

I contemplate making a trip to Ernest Hemingway's boyhood home in Oak Park area of Chicago - west of the hotel. But it seems a cumbersome trip - involving buses, a subway and a short walk. Instead I watch a slide show of the house and decide I ain't missing much although I am totally enamored of Mr. Hemingway.

We visit the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago to see Unbound: Contemporary Art After Frida Kahlo. We tried to visit this museum last time but it was closed on the Monday we were there.

One of Kahlo's paintings on display

Untitled c. 1978 by Ana Mendieta

J has a hankering for Japanese food after some clothes shopping and we stumble on Friends Sushi, 710 N Rush St. and have a late lunch.

We end the night with a teary viewing of teenage angst film The Fault in Our Stars at J's request ... but, if I am honest, I shed more tears at the aquarium than I did at this film. 

On the way home we spy a relatively new eatery/Italian groceteria called Eataly, 43 East Ohio Street. We are all visibly salivating going through the rows of pasta, olive oil, gelato, cheeses, fresh fruits and vegetables ... we have found our lunch spot for the next day!

Day Two in Chicago 2014: This is not a pipe

Rooftop lounge at The Godfrey

Because we travel with a teenager we have to be prepared to eat alone; thus, when J was unable to rise at the ungodly hour of nine a.m. on our second day we retired to the rooftop lounge at the Godfrey for breakfast, sans fils. Excellent breakfast at moderate prices!

R and J at Shedd Aquarium

R had purchased tickets for the Shedd Aquarium, 1200 S. Lake Shore Drive, near Lake Michigan - it was quite expansive and busy. The building was overflowing with children and school groups bearing identical tees for identification. We did many wondrous things there ...  

Some touched sting-rays ...

J and Sting 

Some stared at the jelly fish in wonder ... 

Someone cried when they were told the story of Cruz, the rescued sea lion, who had been blinded by bullets when shot in the face ... (I won't say who). 

Cruz, the sea lion who was rescued

Some took photos, not of fish but of the beautiful art deco details of the aquarium ...

The aquarium has a beautiful outdoor patio that looks on to Lake Michigan where we had a very decent lunch. 

View from the Shedd Aquarium

Afterwards we scooted to the exhibit Magritte: The Mystery of the Ordinary, 1926–1938 at the Chicago Institute of Art. The lighting is very subdued in the gallery which lends it a somewhat funereal aspect but the work still shocks, still enthralls. It's a beautiful museum.

This is not a pipe

Day One in Chicago 2014: Helluva Town

The Godfrey Hotel, Chicago

Porter Airlines is awesome ... Love flying Porter. Anything to escape Pearson Airport - the expense, the distance from home, the security procedures, the lack of cookies and coffee at the gates. We leave at 12.30 and arrive 1.45 or so (we move forward an hour Chicago time). The flight is blessedly uneventful as I am a nervous flier, by far the most nervous of the three of us.

We take a cab to The Godfrey Hotel, 127 West Huron St. This is a new hotel built beside the Felix Hotel (where we were almost a year ago this time) that R found on-line. A great hotel - a clean, spacious room, with a rooftop lounge restaurant, pleasant staff, ten or fifteen minutes from the Magnificent Mile - a popular shopping district. It feels like a spaceship inside (not an abducted-by-aliens-feeling, just a super-cool-and-sleek-feeling).

Vivian Maier exhibit, Harold Washington Library

Selfie at the exhibit

We take transit along the Red Line to see the Vivian Maiers: Out of the Shadows exhibit at Harold Washington Library, 400 South State Street. The exhibit is modest in number of photos displayed but tastefully done in one of the numerous exhibit spaces in this enormous library. They even have a station where you can take a selfie and post it in the exhibit room or take it with you. But what sticks in my mind is the sign I see in the doorway of this large, tasteful, beautifully appointed library:

Seen everywhere ... libraries, restaurants, even the Shedd Aquarium

Why the average American needs a reminder not to bring a gun to the library boggles the mind. And makes me fearful. 

We cast around for a nice place for dinner ... we find The Berghoff, 17 West Adams Street, a restaurant built in the 1890s which has an enormous retro sign from a different era. It serves traditional Germain and American cuisine. The signage, the interior, the food, make us (the parentals) ridiculously happy. Plus ... we are starving. Times are tough. Porter served us a chicken sandwich the size of a small teacup for lunch and not much more. I kept expecting some gangsters to sit down at the table behind ours. They, however, never appear. 

We have wiener schnitzel, perogies, salad. We scoot home to our temporary palace by transit ... satiated and expecting a great day tomorrow at the Shedd Aquarium.