Chicago SIghtseeing

So we knew we wanted to go see "the Bean" at millennium Park in downtown Chicago. We parked in a crazy expensive parking garage-$27 for about 2 hours-and walked out to the park. 

 There are a couple of big wall type of fountains and they change colors and make pictures by some electronic magic as you watch them-pretty cool! Then there's the "big green space" which is where they often have concerts and events. It has this overhead decorative art work covering the whole area. Pretty cool.

 Then just a few steps away is The bean. It's an artwork made of polished stainless steel and was crazy busy with tourists!

 I'm not very good with the selfie business....

 It was pretty funny, we must be pretty polite folks, because it was almost impossible to not walk in front of someone who was taking a photo! We were dodging cameras everywhere! Look though, see we are reflected in the bean! Cool huh!?

 The tall buildings are always fun to see. SO we walked on down to Michigan ave and all the big stores.

 One thing we noticed right away about Chicago-there are security people, event security, park security, store security, traffic security, everywhere you go security!

 Look at those big iron posts holding up the railway line. YES! We drove under the rail line for a long time. It's kind of an eerie feeling and loud when the train goes overhead!

 We went into the Lane Bryant store across the street-they had a security guy there too-it was a nice store but not any larger selection of stuff, just a lot larger space.

 Look at those cool old pillars in the Macy's store-at the other end they had chandeliers! Of course my camera is dying by now...as usual, will I never learn!!!Get an extra phone battery! So then we headed out to Naperville to rest our tired feet at the Hilton Hotel there. Thank you Priceline-name-your-own-price. $67 bucks got us on the 8th floor at the Hilton in Lisle/Naperville.

 Nice room, comfy bed-pillows were feather pillows, but kind of flat, but that's the only thing I could even begin to complain about. Look at the cute coffee station outside the bathroom. I think that's a really nice touch, so many hotels have the coffeemaker on the desk or in the bathroom-YUCK! And I don't even drink coffee!!

 But I have to point out that if you choose to drink that bottle of Evian water there on the bottom shelf, it's gonna cost you $3.25.

 Nice bathroom! I really loved those heavy glass doors! The shower head had a massaging feature too-ahhhhh, so relaxing!

 The hotel was booked to capacity with many weddings and lots of tourists and at least one girl's lacrosse team, but it was still quiet and peaceful. SO the next morning is our big day to hit Antiques Roadshow. We planned to park at McCormick place-only $21 to park for the whole day-and grab a bus or train to go do some more sight seeing.

 We walked along lake Michigan, dodged a few geese and a couple of seagulls.

 HI Honey! There were big yachts and little fishing boats, very fun to see.

We hiked along for quite a ways, and turned in to the museum area and along the outside of Soldier Field, thinking we'd find a bus stop or a train stop, but even though we followed the signs, we missed out on the fun of public transportation. Also a big college football event near Soldier field. Lots of tourists and lots of traffic! Before we knew it, the time was gone and we had to hot foot it back to the McCormick center for Antiques Roadshow....oh boy, we are going to be late so we flag down a taxi. Smart girls that we are! Too bad our taxi driver doesn't get that we need to be at the lakeside area of McCormick Place and tries to drop us in another place, we kept telling him to go to parking lot C but he must have been sign illiterate...anyways, $15 in taxi fair later we are where we need to be! I felt just like those folks on The Amazing Race TV show when their taxi driver gets them lost!!