Day after the concert it was back to Chicago on the midday Delta flight.
I didn't take any photos of this one as it was a short flight, but a very pleasant one.
Finally we got to spend some time in the city instead of bouncing through O'Hare. And we loved it.
What a fabulous city; lots of open spaces, green, lower rise buildings than NYC, amazing use of the riverside, astounding restaurants and food, friendly people; what more does a person need ?
We stayed in the Radisson Blu Aqua on Columbus, just south of Wacker and the river, but close to Millennium Park: really cool place with a terrace off the bar / dining room if you felt in need of some road noise and vehicle fumes.
Dining room and bar
We did the usual tourist stuff, river boat ride, visit the Bean so that you can suffer / enjoy the pictures.
After our boat ride on the last day of summer, so we were told, we stopped off at a place by the name of Howells and Hood in the base of the Tribune building across Michigan from the Wrigley Building.
As usual the food portions were huge: I had a salad for 2 for 1. Mrs 737 lived dangerously and had a Stella: when I lived in Belgium we exported that stuff: it wasn't fit for local consumption.
We had to try a Chicago pizza so went to one of Lou Malnati's outlets.
The pizza must be good judging by the queue to get in and the fact that the place was full. And it was. Probably the finest pizza I have had: beats Grimaldi's in NYC and Johns of Bleeker St.
We were wary of the portion sizes so chose the "Personal size": even that was too big. The couple beside us ordered a bruschetta start: in the UK tha would be 2 slices: they got 16 !
On our last night we had a reservation for Gibsons Italian: well worth the trip. The view is terrific but it was a little too windy to sit on the terrace so we had to move inside.
So it was time to head for home.
The only "gang agley" had happened on our arrival into ORD when the car company we had booked didn't turn up: their excuse was an invalid phone number. HELLO, it's a British number, the address gives you the clue when it says UK.
Just for info, British cell phone numbers start with 07: if you need to dial that number from overseas from a non UK cell phone add 0044 and delete the first zero. Irish cell phones are 087 or 086.
Anyhow, the delightful lady who picked us up to return us to the airport, Leslie McCant, was early.
