Chicago: Dinosaurs and Pizzas

Day 2 of my Illinois trip began with a nice sunrise view of the Chicago river. From there, well, it was busy.

Tuesday AM: We started the day with an expensive breakfast buffet. Even the “continental” (which excluded hot foods) was over $17 per person. All the banana bread and honeydew in the world really didn’t make up for that. But eventually we got in a cab and made our way down to Chicago’s famous Field Museum of Natural History. This is home to Sue, the most complete T-Rex fossil skeleton ever recovered (over 90%). It also had a special exhibit on China’s Terracotta army, some great views of Navy Pier, and was across the street from Soldier Field (where some famous sports team plays, but who cares). Even after nearly 3 hours in the museum, we barely scratched the surface of the place. Thankfully, Ann was too tired after visiting the gift shop to continue on or go to the Art Institute, so we returned to the hotel to recoup.

Tuesday PM: Mary Ann arrived by then, and we got a chance to marvel at her much better, nearly full-on view of Lake Michigan. After some chit-chat, we decided to high-tail it down to Navy Pier to catch one of the boats offered a lakeside tour of Chicago. We got some sun, heard some history, and I took a ton of photos of the Chicago skyline. But the best part of that afternoon came after we disembarked and ended up at Giodarno’s. The place lays claim to a world-famous Chicago-style stuffed pizza, which was worth the insane wait time. We had so much in the way of leftovers, that I ate pizza at every meal Wednesday and also Thursday morning.

For a single day, it was awesome and this short summary really does not do it justice. If you are on Facebook, you should check out the photo album I put up for Chicago. The pictures really do tell the story.