Photomania Part Due: A Wicked Good Time!

If you thought I couldn’t put any more pictures in one post than the Art Car post, you are sadly mistaken!!! I present to you Photomania Part Due: A Wicked Good Time! Yesterday I left you with a photo from me after the Wicked show. Again, it was GREAT and if you ever have the chance to go, DO IT!!

When I travel alone, I mostly let my feet do the walking, so I end up seeing more cool things that aren’t on the map, in addition to the touristy things that are on the map. For lunch one day, the feet guided me to Pizzaria Due (a relative of Pizzaria Uno) where I ate a delectable mushroom and olive deep dish.

After lunch, I made my way (on the bus, it was too far to walk lugging my 30someodd pound suitcase) to the host hotel for the training. I got settled in to my 21st floor room that had an amazing view of the Chicago skyline and coast.

In distance, beyond Soldier Field I could see Navy Pier.

After the opening training session, I set out for the Navy Pier and rode the hotel shuttle (at the suggestion of the concierge). When I found out I would be the only one going there, I hopped off near Millennium Park where I checked out the much talked about Cloud Gate.

From there, I continued to allow my feet to do the walking. They guided me through the rest of Millennium Park, across a walking bridge over the freeway, through another park, along the river, and up and over a driving bridge to the other side of the river. About an hour after hopping off the hotel shuttle I arrived at the Navy Pier.

Yes, it was 43 degrees at 7PM…and got colder from there. I decided a ride on the ferris wheel would be fun. And it was, but it was cold too. And I was all by myself, so I sorta looked like a big nerd. A big, cold nerd, all alone in the gondola taking pictures of herself. See the city in the background.

After the ride, I was hungry and decided to get something to eat, but couldn’t find anything that struck my fancy there at Navy Pier. I thought I was excited about an Italian place until I saw that you order at the register and they bring your food to your table. Um…not exactly what I wanted. So I hopped on a city bus and rode closer to the center of the city. Only I didn’t get off where I had wanted to, so I was a little further than I had hoped. But, I found the Chicago Fire House restaurant where I had a delicious Lobster Bisque topped with puff pastry

and something called the Impossible Pastel…because apparently it is next to impossible to bake all the layers together into one dessert.

After dinner it was close to 10PM, so I hailed a taxi (aka had the valet guys working outside the restaurant hail one for me because I’m really not assertive enough for taxi hailing) to go back to the hotel. I still had to get up in the morning for training and had done enough walking for the day.

In my next few days, after trainings, my time was my own, so I saw this

and this…sorry I don’t know off hand what the exhibit is called.

I saw this….

and this.

Oh yeah, and I saw this from my hotel room window.

Then I saw this….

thinking it was this.

I was disappointed at first, but realized I just didn’t go far enough to see the Buckingham Fountain the first time.

Seriously, I had an almost perfect amount of time there. I was able to see most of the things I really wanted to see, plus do a little shopping and a lot of eating. And there are still a few things I can put on my list for when I go back in August for another work training. Sorry to say mom, but a Segway tour is not on that next time list.

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