Friday 10/31/08. Newark-Chicago on United. Flight okay. Anne and I each had a row to ourselves. Stayed at La Quinta by O'hare.
Saturday 11/1/08. Art Institute of Chicago. I was looking forward to visit this place, with its claim of a large collection of impressionist paintings. Alas, they are building a new “modern wing” for the museum, and thus many of the pieces were in storage. I am sure some van Goghs were on loan to MoMA for the van Gogh “Colors of the Night” show (which I saw several weeks ago in NYC). Fortunately, there were still quite a few well-known pieces like Wood's American Gothic, Hopper's Nighthawk, and Seurat's A Sundady on La Grande Jatte (see below).
We had to wait for 45 minutes or so before we could get into the Shedd Aquarium. They certainly could have run a more efficient ticketing operation, but that would make the exhibit too crowded. I always look forward to aquarium visits but come away a bit disappointed; this was no exception. Surprisingly there was no obligatory shark tank, perhaps we missed it?
To round out the evening, we saw a performance of “The Damnation of Faust” by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Sunday 11/2/08. Walked to Navy Pier. Had a Chicago-style hot dog with pickle and chili pepper. Took the 1-hour architecture river cruise. The tour guide was quite informative (actually we got an information overload) as he talked about the history of the city, the different architecture styles, and some of the landmarks. Buildings we saw included the Sears Tower, the Trump Tower (still under construction), the Lyric Opera, and the Post Office. He also mentioned how the Chicago River was dammed so the polluted water would flow downstream (to St. Louis?) instead of into Lake Michigan. Indeed there are locks to control access to the Lake.
We took the Water Taxi from the Navy Pier to Shedd Aquarium (on Lake Michigan) to visit the Field Museum. We bought tickets for the Aztec exhibit. It was disappointing as I didn't walk away having any deeper understanding of the culture. I did learn the Aztecs empire lasted only 100 years or so. Other displays weren't all that great either. We did get to see Sue, the T. Rex skeleton unearthed in 1990. Another display indicated that out of the last 5 mass extinctions 3 were caused by global cooling and 2 by global warming (if I remember correctly). They are attributing the current mass extinction to man.
Dinner with Cornell friend Emily and her husband Wen at an all-you-can eat Sushi restaurant. We had a lot of food (14 rolls altogether). The food was great, especially when we first started. At about $16 per person, it was a bargain. Time well-spent with old friends.
Monday 11/3/08. Millennium Park. It is a short 15-minute walk from the Comfort Inn we stayed at. Park has many interesting architectural pieces such as the "egg" and the Gehry-designed outdoor concert hall.
The "Egg" (officially called the Cloud Gate) designed by Anish Kapoor.
Frank Lloyd Wright Home & Studio in Oak Park. Anne is much more of a fan of Wright than I am. All this integration with nature is a bit of after-the-fact rationalization as far as I am concerned. I still don't understand why he liked such enclosed spaces, and why the chairs tend to be so small. What's most memorable, though, is the smell of the rotten gingko fruits.
Flight Chicago to Newark. Upgraded to first class and got a free snack (yay!). We are joking we should plan a “Food Tour of Chicago” next time as there are quite a few attractive looking restaurants. As the tour guide said, every thing about Chicago is bigger. Bigger doesn't necessarily mean better though: CSO (compared to New York Philharmonic), Field (Museum of Natural History), Shedd (Baltimore), Art Institute (MoMA), and I can go on. Nonetheless, the trip was quite enjoyable overall.
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