Day 7
We bought a package deal while at the Art Institute the other day that included the Skydeck at the Willis Tower (saved about $8 and a long wait in the ticket line).
It was pretty impressive with a 360° view of the city. On a clear day you can see about 50 miles.
The Skydeck, located on the 103rd floor, has a 4 ft. glass floor that hangs over the edge, to give you that “floating on air” feeling.
The Skydeck level is 412 m (1353 ft.) high. The total height of the Willis building (rooftop before antennas) is 443 m (1450 ft.).
Lots of tourists came for the experience.
We even found the perfect gift for our friend Dave at Willis Tower ( he likes the Old Guys Rule stuff )
For lunch, we walked just over 3 km to another restaurant featured on the TV show, You Gotta Eat Here (Chicago Edition), Manny’s Coffee Shop & Deli. The restaurant opened shortly after WWII, and moved to its current location in 1964.
It is cafeteria style – grab a tray and order what you want along the counter. It is simple, fresh, authentic Jewish food. The continuous line of customers entering assured us we had made the right choice. We each ordered the lunch special: Matzo Ball Soup, a potato pancake, a dill pickle, and for Todd, Pastrami on ½ Rye, and for me Brisket on ½ Kaiser. Good thing we were walking – portions were HUGE.
After a brief rest, we headed to the Chicago River for our boat tour by the Architecture Foundation of Chicago.
It was very interesting learning about Chicago’s history as it related to architecture. What is known as The Loop in Chicago burnt to the ground in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. Since then, architects has designed numerous styles and sizes of buildings in The Loop. The Trump Tower completed in 2009, like Trump himself, is in your face on the riverfront. To combat the wind issues, concrete support pillars that are normally built on bedrock, are drilled 50 ft. deep into the bedrock.
333 West Wacker completed in 1983 has a blue-green glass façade that mimics the colour of the river.
Marina City, known as the corncob towers, completed in 1967 is very unique. It is a development that was ahead of its time incorporating a city within a city (office building, apartments, retail, parking, a theatre and more).
Merchandise Mart completed in 1930 is 2 ½ city blocks (the largest building in the world upon completion). Originally owned by Field & Company, it was sold to the Kennedy family in 1945, who owned it until 1998 (the profited hundreds of millions on the deal).
The Tribune Tower (Chicago Tribune newspaper) was completed in 1925 in Gothic Revival style.
The above pics just touch on the buildings we saw. We also saw some interesting “boats” on the water…( this one maybe a little small for the chopper on it)
After the tour, as sun set, we walked to the John Hancock building (aka 360° Chicago). The picture below shows the building in the daylight.
The Hancock completed in 1968 is 100 floors. We took the elevator to the Signature Lounge on the 96th floor. The view of the city was amazing as night set in.
One of the best views is reserved for women only – it’s in the women’s washroom. A room wide, floor to ceiling glass window allows a great view of the city.
Day 8
This is our final full day in Chicago. We walked to Navy Pier, a 1,010 m (3,300 ft.) pier. It was built in 1916 as primarily a cargo facility for lake freighters.
Today it serves as a multi-purpose public area with exhibition halls, theatres, retail stores, and restaurants.
The currant Ferris wheel will be taken apart at the end of this season and replaced by one double its size (300FT tall).
The views from the pier back to the city are beautiful.
Our final dinner in Chicago was at Berghoff, a German restaurant that has been around since 1898 serving their beer with great German food. Todd had the Sauerbraten and I had the Jager Schnitzel. Food was delicious…
Chicago was a very interesting city – a great walking city with amazing architectural buildings.
Next stop…NYC in a couple of weeks.