Some Chicago Highlights

I still have two more posts to do, one on the Architecture tour and one on Oak Park and Frank Lloyd Wright. Here are some other Chicago photos and moments. Geoff and I rode on the 15 story ferris wheel at Navy Pier. It was right at sunset and so there are some kind of fun photos looking at the city.

Here is Geoff and I on the ferris wheel.

Geoff lives on Lakeshore Dr. in a building designed by Mies Van Der Rohe. There is a corner unit that was recently redone and vacant. This is the view from that unit of the John Hancock Tower and out of the windows in the corner.

These two photos are the views out of Geoff's unit. This is Navy pier. You can just see the Ferris Wheel. It's lit up at night. And this is the view straight down at the lake and Lakeshore Dr.

This is the view from his building to the next building.

This is the building Geoff works in. It's right on the Chicago river and is a well known building. So well known, I can't remember the name. That's the Michigan Avenue bridge in front with all the flags.

I thought this shot of the Wrigley building turned out nice. See how pretty the sky was? I really didn't notice any pollution while I was there. It was a nice clean city.

Some scullers on the Chicago River.










I went to the Oprah Store! It was quite fun. Here is a photo of her studio which is kitty cornered across the street.

A fun evening shot with the AMC Theatres and a bowling alley, all in downtown.

The famed Drake hotel on Lake Shore Drive.

Just a fun sign.

Sunset view.

The "rock and roll" McDonalds. It has displays inside of every era of design in furniture, fads, music etc, since it was founded in Chicago. Lots of things were founded in Chicago that I didn't know about.

A nice shot through downtown, showing the elevated train or "El".

My Hotel.

My bathroom in my hotel.

The faux mink throw that they always arranged on my bed in my hotel.

A nice photo of my friend Geoff.

Views from the John Hancock Building

The John Hancock Building is 96 stories. There is an observatory on the 94th floor. It costs 15$ to go there. Or you can go to the 95th/96th floor for lunch or dinner. I had lunch there for 18$. Not a bad deal. Here are some of the views from the restaurant.

Looking South.

Looking North. Lincoln Park

Looking North and slighlty east of the above photo.

This is straight East. My friend Geoff lives in the building straight below where the boat is, on the 23rd floor.

South East.

Pool ontop of a high rise hotel.

South and slightly West. The Sears Tower is the tallest building with the double spires on it.

Dogs of Downtown Chicago

As most of you know, I love dogs. There are a lot of dogs in Chicago and because they all live in places without yards, they get walked a lot. So you see them on the street all the time. It was fun to see them. I didn't take a photo of all of them, but here are a few that were fun.

These two Golden Retrievers had a little bit of a yard in this town house. They were checking out the action on the street.

There seemed to be quite a few King Charle's Cavalier Spaniels. They are very cute dogs, but none were as cute as Gooch, who was 12 weeks old.

And then there was Gigi, a soft coated Wheaton Terrier. I saw her a couple of times.

Bike Ride in Chicago

I have to say the most favorite thing I did while in Chicago was go bike riding! I think it was partly the lovely cool weather. I rented a bike and it was a really nice one, easier to ride than my own. Geoff rode his own bike. It was also pretty much flat the whole time, which is also easy and enjoyable. And there is lots to look at. I had to rent the bike at Navy Pier as every where else had already closed for the evening. Navy Pier's bike rentals are open until 10pm!

We started along the lake. There is a nice bike, walking, roller blading path along the lake. It was Sunday evening and there were quite a few folks out and so you had to do a bit of dodging.

It looks a lot like the ocean doesn't it?

There were a couple of places I wanted to find. Over by Lincoln Park there was a conservatory. And not too far from that was a place called Oz Park. Frank Baum, who wrote the Wizard of Oz, had lived in the area and so they made a park to commemerate him. We found this neat Lilly Pond near the conservatory.

The Conservatory was closed for the day, but there was a lovely French style garden in front, with a great view of down town. And this is me with my rented bike at the lily pond.

Then we found Oz park. We had to ask quite a few folks before we found it, but we finally did!

Here is Dorothy and Toto, red slippers and all!

The Scarecrow and the Tinman. We didn't really look to find the Cowardly lion, but I am sure he was there somewhere.

And here is Geoff with his bike.

There was a section of the park that was a really nice garden. They called it the Emerald garden. We stopped there and had an Orange Julius.

Afterwards, we road back down city streets. There were some really beautiful buildings that I did not get photos of. We stopped for a minute to look at the Cardinal's Mansion (Catholic). In the grass, in front, in the middle of the city, was a bunny rabbit. Not a jack rabbit, but a little flop eared bunny. I didn't get a good photo as it was pretty dark. It was amazing to see though. Geoff said they have raccoons, bunnies, foxes, coyotes and such in the middle of the city. And I don't mean playboy bunnies, although this is where Hugh Hefner started his whole Playboy Mansion, etc. We saw that too.Then we rode our bikes right up Michigan Avenue to go back to Navy Pier. Michigan Avenue is really busy and I can't believe I rode a bike up it! It was a Sunday evening and maybe wasn't too bad, but it was a little nerve wracking for me. The whole experience was quite delightful overall!

Public Art of Chicago

I just came back from a marvelous trip to Chicago. It was my first time there and a I had a great time. My friend Geoff lives there and was a great tour guide. I am going to try and split up my posts, because as usual, I have a lot of photos and things I want to say.

First, I love the public art in Chicago. Not only are the pieces really interesting, but a lot of them are interactive and by very famous artists. First here is the scupture by Picasso! It's a horse.

Almost directly across the street is a sculpture by the Spainard, Joan Miro. It's called the Mother.

Not too far away is a piece by Calder. It's called the flamingo. My friend, Geoff, who is working in Chicago as an architect is doing some work with this sculpture now. The plaza it sits on is leaking into the levels below. He is starting a project to replace the plaza and also fix the sculpture so it won't rust. Pretty cool, huh?

In Millenium park there are several pieces. There is an amphitheater and bridge that were designed my Geary. My friend Geoff got to be part of the local architecture team that worked on them in Chicago. They are pretty awesome looking, the metal that looks like it's curling back from the amphitheatre and the overlapping metal shingles on the bridge. I took a lot of photos of the bridge, I will only post one here. It was pretty awesome looking. At the amphitheatre there was a free preformance of the music from the Pirates of Penzance. That was pretty cool too!

Also in Millenium Park is what Geoff called the Bean. It has some other name but I don't know what it is. It was pretty cool. As you can see, it's highly reflective and interactive. People can walk under it. There is another piece nearby, with a face on it in LED lights. There is water that runs over the top of it. The face changes and after awhile it purses it's lips and looks like it's spitting water. I didn't get a good photo of it. You can just barely see the top of the face over the trees in this photo. They are also putting what they call pavillions in Millenium Park. They just finished the first one. I don't much get this one, but it is something you can walk around under. It had rained and it was wet. There were kids in swimsuits slipping and sliding all over it.

There was also a sculpture copied from the painting American Gothic. These figures are huge.

Inside the Chicago Cultural Center, there was some really cool art glass from the 20's.

I'm going to do a separate post just on architecture, but there were some neat gargolye figures on top of the main public library too.

I have not felt as engaged with the public art here in Phoenix, but it does make me what to go and take some photos and see what I think after looking at it again. I really like Chicago and what they have invested in themselves over time.