Posted by admin | Posted in Build a Shed | Posted on 02-12-2009
Tags: aquariums, chicago
Hello from Chicago – Part 2 – What a fabulous city Photogenic!
Chicago, Screenz Internet Cafe, Saturday, October 21, 2005, 9:15 am
Yesterday I woke up at 5:00 am Chicago time and I thought I could also get ahead of the crowd at the Arlington House Youth Hostel and take an early shower. At 6 am I was on the Internet, recording my first impressions of this lively and 6:30 am he had left the hostel. He was still dark outside and the sun was beginning slowly rise.
I walked through the quiet neighborhood of Lincoln Park to reach the shores of Lake Michigan, where the wind was howling cool lake. Brokers, cyclists and walkers were already in full force. I wandered for about 15 minutes, but when the wind is too strong I decided to take a bus and head south to a neighborhood called "Old Town", near North Street and N. Wells Street. It is an orderly and well maintained neighborhood of historic houses and the location of the Second City Comedy Club a place that has generated so many talents for comedy.
After a cool morning walk Old Town I hopped back into the train and went to check out the city. I got in the Loop and headed for the opening of the Michigan Avenue and Grant Park. Interestingly, the wind through the buildings in the Loop was much higher than in areas open near the shoreline of Lake Michigan.
Michigan Avenue and Grant Park is one of the areas where Chicago's beauty is most striking. Daniel Burnham Plan 1909 City of maintaining a large amount of green space right on the shore of Lake Michigan was a brilliant decision, and benefit local residents and visitors alike green area between the large loop and the lake. Grant Park beginnings actually date all the way back to 1835, when foresighted citizens, fearing the lake development trade, lobbied to protect open space. Burnham's vision of the park as a formal landscape with museums and civic buildings became reality: today Grant Park has three of the most distinguished museums in the city: The Field Museum of Natural History, Shedd Aquarium and Adler Planterium.
Buckingham Fountain is the centerpiece of Grant Park, the city great "backyard" and is set within a beautifully landscaped garden, one of the best examples of the city with a fine landscape design Arts style. It is an exact replica of the fountain at Versailles, just twice as large, and the measurements is a major source of free standing in the world.
At the north end of Grant Park is Millennium Park, with an investment of $ 495,000,000 more ambitious public undertaking in Chicago. Unsightly railroad tracks and parking became a multi-media entertainment area outdoors during the last years. Among Millennium Park's prominent features are designed by Frank Gehry Jay Pritzker Pavilion, the site of outdoor concerts most sophisticated of its kind in the United States, a mirror dressed winding street bridge over Stetson, designed by world renowned architect Frank Gehry, and "Cloud Gate" ("The Bean"), a popular sculpture inspired by liquid mercury, Designed by British artist Anish Kapoor. In this beautiful sunny morning, the reflections of the skyscrapers of the city had an almost surreal feel to them.
She still had an hour and a half before my friend Linda would arrive at the Randolph Street station, so he decided to head north on Michigan Avenue to two my favorite buildings: the Wrigley Building and Tribune Tower in Chicago. The Wrigley building serves as the headquarters of the Wrigley (chewing gum) company and was built in 1920 by founder Company, William Wrigley Jr. was the first of a series of milestones at the southern end of the Magnificent Mile.
The design of the Tribune Tower was the result of an international competition for "most beautiful office building in the world", made in 1922 by the Chicago Tribune. The entries in the competition was very different influential in the development of skyscraper architecture in the 1920s. The winning entry, with a tower crowned the buttresses, is derived from the design of the cathedral French Rouen and gives the building its striking silhouette.
The area around the Michigan Avenue bridge, looking west along the Chicago River Esplanade is a mecca total for an amateur like me architecture. You will find a mixture of classic skyscrapers, many of them built in Art Deco style and modern skyscrapers built over the past 30 years. This has to be one of the most stunning urban landscapes that exist anywhere.
I walked toward west on Wacker Drive and walked past a number of north-south streets that connect the Loop with the areas north of downtown. I wanted to capture another fascinating building: Merchandise Mart, an impressive building on the north bank of the Chicago River between Wells and New Orleans Street, was built in 1931. At that time, when it was built by Marshall Field and Company to replace Marshall HH Richardson Wholesale Store Field, was the building with the largest area in the world and today is the second largest building in the United States after Pentagon.
Two steps back on the train the "I got off at Randolph Street to pick up my friend Linda, who was scheduled to arrive at 10:25 am on the south coast railway line. We've known each other since we are 10 years old (almost 30 years!) And grew up in Austria, and Linda moved to the United States several years ago. We had not seen for two years and this was the time to reconnect.
Linda arrived a few minutes late and after we went a sincere congratulations Chicago Cultural Center to try to pick up a transit pass for 3 days. To our surprise we were told that the nearest location for transit passes several days was the Marriot Hotel at 549 North Michigan Avenue, about 20 minutes walk north of where we were. We were a little surprised that it would be so uncomfortable for visitors arriving in the loop for the purchase of transit passes, but we went with Linda's suitcase in tow and we could finally pick up our coveted 3-day transit pass Gift shop second floor of the Marriot Hotel.
We decided to get rid of Linda's luggage and headed north towards the hostel on the bus. By then it was late and we were both voraciously hungry. So we plunked down in a comfortable place called the "Pasta Bowl" on Clark Street and I had a gorgonzola pasta really delicious that I absolutely devoured.
From there we went to the Arlington House, Linda left luggage and rest a bit and we were both very tired After this lunch strong. At 4 pm it was launched again and fell to the Golden Mile, Chicago's main shopping area along Michigan Avenue, north of the river Chicago. The place was absolutely jumping with people. We took a little gift for Linda's daughter at H & M and then went up into the John Hancock Center, Chicago third-tallest building.
The view from John Hancock Center was amazing and the sun was about to set. Chicago skyline is impressive, as it is crowned by the Sears Tower. After our trip up strolling along Michigan Avenue and for dinner we went back to the Lincoln Park area, where we had a Mexican dinner very filling vegetarian burrito in Lincoln Avenue.
Exhausted by all this exploring and eating, we returned to the Arlington House to crash in our bunk bed …
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Susanne Pacher is the publisher of Travel and Transitions (
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Shedd Aquarium Chicago