The Windy City

And they do call it the windy city for a reason!  We've had beautiful sunny weather here in Chicago but the constant breeze makes the temperature feel colder than it is!  Today is our last day here and we are spending our last few moments in our hotel room, taking advantage of the cable TV!  But don't worry, we haven't just been watching TV during our visit!  When we first arrived, we hopped on a train from the airport which took us almost right to our hotel!  The train runs right through city and in some places (like right out front our hotel) it runs right over top of the road.  It's actually really neat and a good way to see the city!  After checking into our hotel, we headed straight to the "Millennium Park", a short walk away.  Millennium Park is the home of the outdoor skating rink and the "Cloud Gate" which looks like a large bean!

Outdoor Skating Rink

The Cloud Gate at night.

The following morning, after realizing I had washed my hair with the hotel's lotion instead of conditioner, I re-washed my hair and we set out to walk around the city!

A view of Chicago from Navy Pier

At one of the elevated train stops

After walking around for hours in the only pair of shoes I brought (my boots with heels), I realized that trying to look good all day was just not reasonable!  So we decided to do a bit of shopping and I bought a pair of flat boots!  My feet are still thanking me!  That evening, we went to "The Second City", a comedy club where many famous people such as Tina Fey, John Candy, Chris Farley and Amy Poehler started their careers!

The following day we went back to Millennium Park so we could see it during the day and then walked down one of the main streets for shopping and well, did some shopping!

Can you find Leah and Carl's reflection in the Cloud Sculpture?

A view of the city

Ok, so maybe my pose isn't quite as good as hers...

Crossing over the canal

 After a few hours of shopping, it was time for lunch and we couldn't visit Chicago without trying what their known for, the deep dish pizza!

Yum!

Our order got a little messed up, nothing big (Carl got my spinach on his pizza) so the waitress gave us a free dessert (not that we had room)!  We were given a deep dish dessert!  A chocolate chip cookie bottom piled with ice cream, whipped cream and chocolate drizzle!  And we thought we were gonna loose weight this trip with all the walking...Not quite!

The rest of our time in the city was just spent exploring.  We went to a Blues club one night for dinner and watched a live band, we went on an architecture walking tour and we relaxed!  We figured we were in Chicago so we had to see someone famous...And we did!  As we were walking into a restaurant so was Brendan Morrison and his family.  I of course had no idea who he was but Carl put his hand on his shoulder, said that we were from Vancouver and were big fans!  He seemed like a nice guy and said he appreciated the comment.  As we walked away I realized that I should have asked him if he remembered going to "Two Way" hockey school!  My Grandpa taught Brendan Morrison at his hockey school and anyone that was taught by my Grandpa would remember him :)  

A look down the street by our hotel

Overall we had a nice visit to Chicago and would tell anyone that has the chance to check it out, to do it!

Chicago Bound!

Ahhh vacation!  At least that's what I wish I was feeling!  Carl and I booked a vacation to Chicago a few weeks ago and the day has finally come!  Our flight leaves from Syracuse, New York which is about a 2 hour drive from home so instead of waking up at 1:30am, we decided to splurge and book a hotel in Syracuse.  We arrived last night and went to bed early, preparing for our early start this morning!  Now, I'm not sure if you remember but at Christmas time we flew out of Syracuse and ended up missing our flight because the line ups were horrendous!  We decided this time that we were gonna be early to avoid the anxiety and possibility of again, missing our flight!  The alarm went off at 3:30am and we headed to the airport - so far so good!  We got to our check in counter and the line up wasn't to bad AND we still had lot's of time!  We self checked in and were about to check our luggage when I noticed that our boarding pass didn't look right...Our flight was to leave at 6am but our boarding pass said it wasn't leaving until noon?  I must have checked us in for the flight home?  Or there must just be some kind of mistake?  We took our boarding passes to the front desk to inquire.  Sure enough, our flight had been cancelled!  Apparently the flight crew had gotten in late last night and needed more sleep!  And we were worrying about being late, ha!  Now we have EIGHT hours to waste at an airport with NOTHING in it and all I want is to be back in bed!  I could have slept in my own bed and had a regular nights sleep!   

Here is us, waiting at the airport!

Carl - calm , cool, and collected!

Leah - tired, hungry, grumpy, agitated, frustrated and just not very fun to be around right now!

Instead of getting to Chicago at 10am, we will now not be arriving until 4pm and still have a 50minute train ride to take!  I'm pretty disappointed that we have pretty much lost a whole day!  Maybe we just aren't meant to travel.  I know that things like this "make a better story" but I think at this point I'm ok with a boring story to tell!  It's now 8am and we've been waiting 4 hours, just another 4 more to go!

Happy Valentine's!

I currently have a lot of time on my hands (you'll find out why in the blog to follow) so I thought I would wish you a happy belated Valentine's Day!  For our Valentine's, we kept it pretty low key.  We decided to go for a light dinner of sushi and go big on dessert!  The sushi was good but the dessert was even better!  I took Carl to the newest dessert place in town called Spin!  They serve homemade ice cream in a variety of ways including crepes and sundae's, which is what we ordered! 

Leah's "One Sweet Day" Selection

Carl's choice "Return to Innocence"

YUM!

The Doctor's In The House!

Even though this week we had a visit from a doctor, no need to worry, we're not sick!  My friend from home came for a visit!  Mel just finished med school at UBC and is spending about 3 weeks traveling all over Canada to do interviews at various schools for her residency.  One of her stops just happened to be in Kingston where she did an interview at Queens!  I took a day off work last week to show her around Kingston!  We walked around downtown, went into some stores, and of course stopped at one of Kingston's most famous tourist attractions, the Kingston Penitentiary!    

Mel in front of the Kingston Pen

 From there we drove to Gananoque so Mel could get a short but sweet view of some of the Thousand Islands!  That night we decided to take Mel to one of our favorite restaurants in town "The Works".  It's a burger joint with over 30 varieties of burgers!

Carl and I sharing a milkshake, yes in a measuring cup!  That's just how "The Works"...Works!

Me and Mel taking the first bite of our DELICIOUS burgers!

It was so nice to have Mel come stay with us for a few nights!  It made me miss my friends back home, which makes me really think that...More friends should come visit :)