Chicago Rewind

Chicago Land 

About a month ago Shaun and I decided one Saturday that we were going to venture into the city. (We have been living about 30 minutes outside the city.)

Anyway, it was quite the day. Everyone at church kept telling us how expensive it was to park in the city so we took their advice and rode the train into town. Little did we know that it only comes every one-two hours on Saturday. When we got to the train station we had to wait awhile for the next train. It was about a 70 minute train ride because it stopped at EVERY town along the way.  

Needless to say we didn't get to the city until almost 12:30. 

Our adventure does not stop there... Once we made it to the city the next step was purchasing a day pass to ride the bus and commuter train. You would think they sold it at the train station. Think again, you have to go the the nearest CVS. Well, we got our bus passes but of course CVS doesn't carry maps of the city at that store. Are you kidding me? Being that Shaun and I are on a very tight budget having an I-phone is out of the question so we decided the next best thing was to call our friends Sterling and Michelle to give us some direction on where to go. (They visited Chicago a little while ago) They were kind enough to give us a little orientation over the phone of where we were and where to go. 

On our way to the restaurant they recommended we saw a walgreens and stopped there to buy a map. Yea, success we finally have a map! By now it was 1:30 and getting very hot. We had a nice lunch and made a plan on where to go next. Shaun had already meticulously planned out with google where we were going and what buses/ trains we needed to take to get there but we discovered there were not any signs or maps at the bus stations indicating where we needed to go. :( Thanks to Sterling, My sister, and my mom we made it where we wanted to go. 

I think I am about 30 weeks pregnant here. So grateful I wore my walking shoes!! 

"The Bean" was huge and so cool!  

While walking through Millennium park we saw this waterfall in the distance. It didn't look very far away so we decided to walk. It was actually a VERY long walk away, however, we saw some cool things on our way. Chicago was having their art festival with local artists. It was INCREDIBLE! If we were rich we definitely would have some of their art hanging in our house. 

The ironic part was when we got to the water feature you couldn't even get within 5 feet because it was all fenced off. We were hoping it would help us cool off! 

 This was at the Navy Pier! This was also a very cool place with lots of things to do. Definitely more geared toward children but still fun. By now it was 5 O'clock and although I was being very diligent about drinking water I was exhausted! We had done LOTS of walking! 

This was taken as we were waiting for the bus. There was a bus that went directly from the Navy Pier to the train station. We called my mom and she gave us the times that the train was departing. 6:20 and then not again until 8:20. We waited and waited for the right bus...at 5:40 we decided to jump on a different bus....to make a long story short Shaun and I got dropped off at the train at 6:15. We ran (as well as a pregnant woman can run) but missed our train by 2 minutes. 

We wandered around and found dinner and then went back to the train until it came. We got home about 10 pm. Shaun looks pretty good after such a hot day. 

Things we learned on our day out: 

• an I-Phone would've have been SO nice to have
• Buy a good map before you go to a city. 
• Our GPS on "walking mode" does not work. :)
• Plan on things taking much longer than expected 
• Most importantly despite every change of plans possible have a really fun time being together. Even though it sounds like a frustrating day Shaun and I still really enjoyed seeing the sights of the city. If we ever go back to Chicago or any other big city we will be much more prepared.