But aside from the weather woes, easily solved by coat-wearing, we really did enjoy our trip to the windy city. Here's our final itinerary, complete with my thoughts and recommendations.
Thursday: This was a half day for us, so we checked out the shops on the magnificent mile, including the American Girl doll store (Note: It was actually kind of hard to explain to someone--in this case, Nathan--the complexities that surround American Girl dolls.) Around sunset, we went to the John Hancock tower, hoping for some great photo opportunities. We got them.
Now, here is where I will preface that if we had to do this trip over again, I don't know if we would have not gone to the very top observation deck, but the bar/restaurant that's up there. We did the city pass (which I recommend a lot) which got us admission into five different attractions, with front of the line privileges. They were: Field Museum, Shedd Aquarium, Sears (Willis) Tower, John Hancock tower OR Museum of Science and Industry, and then the Art Institute OR the observatory. So, we could have gone to the Museum of Science and Industry instead if we'd just gone to the bar. BUT. While I have no comparison since we didn't go to the bar, what was kind of nice about the observatory was that we could really just walk around and take tons of photos at different places.
And here comes your next lesson. We went over to Giordano's pizza, which had been recommended, and it was a 45 minute wait when we got there. We decided we didn't want to wait, and then commenced to walk around the city for about 20 minutes trying to figure out what we wanted to eat. Somehow, we ended up at Giordano's again because we got turned around, so we decided just to eat there. Then the wait was an hour-plus. But all the time we spent was totally worth it for the most amazing pizza ever.
Friday: This was a big day for us. We went to the Field Museum AND the Shedd Aquarium. Lots to take in. The Field Museum had so many cool exhibits--one on dirt, one on cave paintings in France, and the T-Rex. We really could have probably spent a whole day here. The Shedd Aquarium was fun, as well, and there were cute baby belugas (which basically ensured that I sang the Raffi song all weekend) and an interesting exhibit on sharks. We ate dinner at Michael Jordan's steakhouse, which was amazing.
Saturday: We braved the El on the weekend to head out to the Frank Lloyd Wright house and Oak Park. As you learned before, my mom and I had looked at the houses he designed around Oak Park, but Nathan and I went inside the actual house he lived in. It was very cool for house nerds such as myself, though we both agreed that we wished there was more focus on his life than was provided. After a visit to Navy Pier, we also explored the city via water on an architecture tour, which was great because our tour guide was hilarious and also very knowledgeable.
Sunday: Now, we unintentionally booked our trip over Easter weekend, and I didn't think anything would be open that day so we got tickets to "The Book of Mormon." But, as it turned out, almost everything was open so we probably could have gone to a museum this day and might have had smaller crowds and gone to the play another night. We did go to the Sears Tower after the play though, and it was pretty busy, so maybe we planned right.
Monday: Our flight left Monday afternoon, so we spent the morning at the art institute. We hit up all of the high points and still had some time to explore some other exhibits. And surprisingly, we didn't have any flight trouble either way, except a few gate changes.
Chicago is definitely close enough to go back to, and I think there's still so much we could have done. I think a trip back is definitely in order.
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