To Chicago and beyond

Chicago skyline from Lake Shore Dr bike path

6/5 - Friday... Our 30 mile ride turned into 37, due to some re-routing and construction.  We took the hybrid tandem (fat-tire) bike because 12 of the miles were on a rails-to-trail.   We should have taken the road bike as the trail was well packed limestone.   Today we encountered the heat and humidity expected in the Midwest, making for a little more difficult ride.

After riding, we drove into Chicago (Hinsdale, actually) to visit and stay with Joel and Sandy Pundmann.  Joel went to Rolla with Ted and was the best man in our wedding many, many years ago.  While we have stayed in touch, we haven’t seen them for probably 25 plus years, so it was good to catch up. 

6/6 - Saturday – Joel, Ted and Beth headed into downtown Chicago to ride Lake Shore Drive and see some of the Chicago highlights.  Lake Shore Drive is beautiful with fantastic views of the city.  It goes by Navy Pier, Shedd Aquarium and the Institute of Art museum.  It is a well-used bike path, with charity runs, a half-marathon, and many sightseers walking, on bikes and Segways sharing the path so it was very slow and go.  We then biked to Buckingham Fountain and back to where we had parked the RV. 

The "Bean" at Millennium Park 

Parking in Chicago is a challenge, especially for a large vehicle.   Thanks to a Kenny Chesney concert, we could not park in the lot in the Millennium park lot that Joel had scouted out earlier in the week.  We found a pay lot just off Michigan Ave a few blocks away.  The sign said oversize vehicles and trucks were $30/day, but there was no attendant in the lot and the self-pay system defaulted to $20 with no option to change anything.  When we returned to the RV, there was a $75 parking ticket stuck on the windshield.  An attendant was in the lot and said we should have paid for 2 spaces.  Needless to say, that was a sour note.  Joel, let us know how the protest works out.   Otherwise, we’ll most likely never be back in Chicago with the RV anyway… sue me!

We left the RV where it was and walked down Michigan Ave.   The art museum had outfitted the lions out front with Blackhawk hockey helmets… they are in the Stanley Cup finals.   And of course we had to have a Chicago hotdog, Garrett's "Chicago mix" popcorn (cheese flavored mixed with caramel popcorn) and see “The Bean”.

6/7 – Sunday… After stocking up on groceries and buying a new tire for the road tandem we left the Chicago area and moved about 60 miles west to Shabbona Lake State Park.   Today has been cloudy and rainy so no riding.   Played some board games and Ted took some time to do some bicycle maintenance.    Hoping to get a ride in tomorrow.

6/8 - Monday … It rained most of the night, but clear blue skies by 9AM.  We had planned a 35 mile route through the farm country around the Shabbona area.  We hit a couple of unplanned dirt roads, but in most cases the dirt roads were in better shape than some of the highways.  We are near Dekalb, IL, which is clearly in the heart of corn country.  Dekalb seed corn was founded in 1912.  So spending most of our 35 mile ride in corn fields was no big surprise… and having a constant wind wasn’t much of a surprise either since most corn fields had several wind turbines.  It was a great ride even with a little wind.

Looking up inside "The Bean"