Winter wonderland: Sunday 22/2/26

Sunday 22/2

Can you believe that it snowed last night and there is  light dusting of snow on everything this morning in Chicago.  Bad news is that it is very cold -7degrees Celsius and worse with wind chill.  The good news is that it is not snowing this morning and no problem going outside.

We decided to go to the Navy Pier which is a big tourist place not far for breakfast and a look around. We took a taxi and arrived to find it deserted. OK it was 9am on a Sunday morning.  We walked along the pier and everything was shut.  The cafes and restaurants etc all shut. We asked one of the very few joggers who told us they generally open at 11am.  (Who would have thought???)

deserted

Look at the snow.

Surprisingly not that cold when dressed appropriately, scarf, gloves, coat and good shoes. A beanie would also be good.

A nice couple told us they had found an open cafe 10 minutes away. The only place open in miles (not kilometres).  

What a relief when we found it 20 minutes later!!

Not only was Cupitol open but they had gluten free bread and cake.

My omelette with bread. Paul also had an omelette and we shared the fruit. Nice coffee as well. This place was full by the time we left.  

After breakfast we eventually found our way walking back to the hotel. It was not easy as we had to cross a river and a couple of motorways and go up 2 sets of stairs.

Trump tower

More snow

up the river

the snow is starting to melt. Noooooo

Back at the hotel, we went back to the gym on the 40 something floor for really great views. Almost makes you want to use the gym.....

Not quite.

We then had an amazing lunch at Cooper's Hawk winery and restaurant with Mike, Izzy's dad who lives in Chicago and is almost a local.  

And just by good fortune, they had an actual gluten free menu with lots of options.

my gluten free burger bun next to the normal bread. disappointing.

My prawn and scallop risotto. Best ever risotto.

Paul had a pork chop

Mike had a chicken dish

All meals were excellent so we had to have dessert.

My Salted 

caramel Creme Brulee  (number 4 or 5?)

Mike had a key lime tart that looked amazing.

Thank you Mike for a great choice of restaurant. See you in Australia soon!

And then our big adventure going to a NBA game. The Nix and Chicago Bulls were playing and Paul had organised tickets weeks ago. BUT there was a slight problem that none of us, including person from Ticketmaster, could fix. They were not downloading with bar codes. Sorry that is a bit technical.  But we decided to just go and see what happened. 

It was very cold in Chicago today but we were looking forward to being indoors for the game so not too worried.  On our arrival at the centre by taxi, we saw a line up waiting outside in the cold for the stadium doors to be open about 1.5 hours prior to the start of the game(!). Paul realised soon after lining up that he had lost a glove and probably left it in the taxi.  Very bad news as it is really cold and you need gloves or your fingers will freeze off.   A little while later,  a taxi came past us in the line and our taxi driver called out waving Paul's glove.  Unbelievable.

Eventually the doors opened and we got to the gate and though the security check but then Paul's tickets did not work. Our worst fears confirmed. Solution: Go back outside the stadium and around the other side to the booking office so they can print the tickets,  and then come back................  Shattering.  Gets worse as we could not find the booking office in the direction suggested. So we went the other way, asking at least 2 other people till we found it. (Just for info, I did 1,356 steps in this search)

Once in, fortunately there were elevators to the top section of the stadium where our seats were.  Unfortunately we were in Row 14 so we had to climb 14 steps. It was very high up. There were only 2 more rows above us.    Scary high!

our view 

so much razzamatazz

Look, Benny cam. Seemed important

It was a spectacular show, with entertainment at quarter times and timeouts and loud music throughout.  I think there was some basketball in there as well. Our team,  the Chicago Bulls were leading slightly when we decided to leave before the end as we were worried about our ability to find a taxi after the game along with 20000 other people.

We walked out of the stadium and there was a taxi out the front.  Home in 25 minutes. Not as hard as we thought it would be.  

It was very cold however.  Chicago is cold with 'light snow' but OK to be in outside.  We were very lucky to have left New York on Saturday morning as there is now a blizzard in New York and a State of Emergency called.   The airport shut on Sunday morning so if we had been one day later, we would still be in New York.  Scary thought.

I am still hoping for more 'light snow' as it looks so pretty and luckily no blizzard here.  In fact tomorrow we are doing a river cruise,  if the river has not frozen over. Gotta love winter in America.