Weekend In Chicago: Day 1-Part 2

Author's Note: This post is rather lengthy. But it encompasses the middle portion of the first day of our recent trip to Chicago. I'll do my best to keep subsequent posts in this series a bit shorter. But as you know I am a man of many words, so no promises.  

The Magnificent Mile and Hancock Observatory

After visiting the Sky Deck and having deep dish pizza for lunch Paula and I were back in our car and heading up toward the 900 block Michigan Avenue. 

So far Chicago seemed a lot like any other big city; lots of traffic and plenty of people. But, as I told Paula, the part of downtown we'd seen seemed a lot cleaner and slightly slower paced than downtown Manhattan in New York City. 

But then we crossed over the river and entered the Magnificent Mile. It is a "high end" shopping district and the main artery of the heart of the Chicago. It is a bustling area that's a combination of office buildings, four star hotels and vertical malls with anchor stores like: Sachs, Macy's, Bloomingdales, and Norstroms. 

The "Mag Mile" was extremely congested with traffic and pedestrians. The combination of taxi's rushing to pick up passengers and CTA buses making their frequent stops made for a very difficult drive especially when trying following a GPS. All the tall buildings looked alike and we weren't sure which one we were looking for. 

The sidewalks on both sides of the street were crowded with people.Most of them were people sight seeing or out shopping. They were collectively flowing up and down the street like streams of humanity. It reminded me very much of the Times Square or Broadway areas of New York City. 

Although I have experience driving in this type of big city traffic I hadn't done it for several years. It was somewhat overwhelming. 

At the end of the 800 block of Michigan Avenue Nova, our GPS, told us, "you have reached your destination." But we didn't see anything that said John Hancock Observatory. 

I wasn't sure where to go so I kept on driving. Michigan Avenue turned into Lake Shore Drive. Soon we were out of the "Mag Mile" area and driving along the Lake Michigan shore line through the neighborhoods north of downtown. 

We drove around for about 20 minutes trying to find our way back down to Michigan Avenue. We couldn't find our way through the maze of street, highways, and exit ramps. But the silver lining to this navigation cloud was that we had the chance to see parts of the city we had not planned on visiting. 

We passed community fairs, Lincoln Park and the entrance to the zoo. It was one of those nice neighborhood areas that I read about in my travel guides. Despite the navigation frustration seeing this part of the city was rather interesting. 

Once we got back onto the "Mag Mile" area we were faced with another problem. We couldn't find a place to park. Unlike the area of downtown further south, there didn't seem to be any parking garages at all. 

Finally we drove down Walton Avenue where we found the elusive "parking" signs. This is where I learned my lesson to make sure you use "self park." 

I pulled into a valet parking garage like the one Matthew Brodrick used in Ferris Bueller's Day off? That was a big mistake. Paula and I only spent about 2 or 3 hours on Michigan Avenue but it cost me $26. Needless to say I was not happy about that. But lesson learned.

We walked a block down to the John Hancock building. We found the entrance to the observatory elevator. We gave the attendants at the desk our "fast pass" tickets and road to the 94th floor. 

The observatory windows were large panes of glass giving you a much better view of the city than the Sky Deck. Here are some of my favorite pictures, one from each direction. 

East

West

North

South

Once we were back on the ground floor it was time to start our own shopping excursion down Michigan Avenue. 

We headed south, stopping at the Water Tower Place mall. This is one of those vertical malls I mentioned. It had 7 floors.  

It got it's name because it's across Michigan Avenue from the historic Chicago water tower; one of the handful of buildings to survive the great Chicago fire. 

The water tower was probably my favorite building in a town full of amazing architecture.  In this picture you can see that in the contrast with it's surroundings it really stands out. To me it looks like a castle. 

Historic Water Tower

The first store we went into at Water Tower Place was The American Girl Place. I was told about this store by a friend. He advised me that although it's target customers are a very specific demographic, the store had to be seen to be believed. Is that ever the truth. 

The store is 2 floors of rooms and rooms filled with dolls, doll clothes, books, services, all of which fall under the "American Girl" brand. 

I had never heard of "American Girl" before I walked into the store. Talk about your high end toys and collectibles. You really do have to see it for yourself. 

I didn't take any pictures of the store but if you are curious here's a link to it's website. http://www.americangirl.com/stores/location_chi.php

Although I wasn't interested the American Girls store. To tell you the truth I was awed at it's excess and jealous that it wasn't for something I liked. But that was coming. 

We walked out of the doll store and into the 2nd floor of the mall. There we came face to face with this. 

Lego Woody and Me

This was Toy Story figure was sitting outside a Lego store. Other than in Walt Disney World, I had never seen a store devoted to Lego before. 

The store was full of all kinds of Lego sets. Harry Potter, Pirates of the Caribbean, Star Wars and NASA sets. The back wall was full of bins of Lego pieces of all shapes, sizes, and colors. You could fill create your own custom set. What a great idea. 

There were several cool looking large object made from Lego throughout the store. This included a dragon, a cowboy, and  models of both the Willis Tower and John Hancock building. 

 

There was also a Lego water tower (upper right picture) that was part of a fountain system that cascaded down from floor to floor of the mall in between the escalators. It was cool. 

We only explored a few floors of Water Tower Place. One of the last stores we went into was called "Chiaroscuro." It was an art store filled with the most unusual and unique home decor items I've ever seen. I could try and give you some details about it but I wouldn't do it justice. If you are ever in the Water Tower Place mall I highly recommend going to visit Chiaroscuro. 

Before we left Michigan Avenue and headed toward Navy Pier we had one more stop. We walked 3 blocks south to the Chicago Disney Store.  

It had been a while since I'd been in a Disney Store and their merchandise has changed. It was mostly all stuff for kids. I managed to find a t-shirt with "Chicago" and the Disney Fab 5 (Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto) printed on it in my size. We also bought a pair of small Mickey and Minnie Mouse plush dolls, for our grand daughter, Aria. 

As we were paying for our purchases the store's closing time passed. The woman who was the store manager came around the store singing "Now it's time to say good-bye to all our company" and the rest of the old Mickey Mouse Club song. As she sang she was turning off the store's lights; politely but firmly informing customers that it was now time to leave the store. 

We finished our purchase and headed for the door. As we walked through it the manager said smiling, "Have a magical night" and swiftly closed and locked the door. Extremely passive aggressive in strange and funny way. She truly was someone who enjoys drinking the Disney Kool Aid. 

By this time Paula and I were both hungry but mostly we were thirsty. We got a couple of bottles of water at the one of the shops at the John Hancock building. We walked back to the car and head to Navy Pier. 

This is where I am going to end this 2nd installment about our first day in the Windy City. One more post will finish our very busy Saturday. I promise it will be a good one because there's fireworks. 

...To Be Continued