Spent the next two days touring Downtown Chicago. On Monday afternoon Tita Isa dropped me off at the
Art Institute of Chicago (General admission $23, Students $17) since she had to go see patients.
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| Art Institute of Chicago |
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| One of the two famous lions that guard the entrance |
It's another huge museum - second largest after the Met, but much easier to navigate.
They had a very impressive Impressionist (my favorite!) and Post-Impressiont collection.
I looked for the paintings featured in "
Ferris Bueller's Day Off" ;)
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| A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jette by Seurat |
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| The Bedroom by Van Gogh |
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| Chagall's America Windows |
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| Nighthawks Edward Hopper |
There was a special exhibit on
Magritte, a famous Surrealist artist. Surrealism is ot my cup of tea, but some works were really interesting.
After visiting the Art Institute, I walked up to Millennium Park. It was built to celebrate, well, the millennium, but actually opened four years later in 2004.
Wrigley Square with the Millennium Monument.
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| Wrigley Square |
Crown Fountain, a pretty cool video sculpture. The two transparent glass brick towers display videos of faces (the faces change every so often), and in between the towers is a reflecting pool. There is a segment in the video when the lips of the faces form a small '
o' and at this moment, water spouts out from the tower as if from the lips.
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| Crown Fountain |
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| Crown Fountain |
The famous
Cloud Gate, also nicknamed the Bean because of its shape. Composed of 168 stainless steel plates, the surface reflects and distorts the Chicago skyline.
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| Skyscrapers as reflected in the Bean |
The
Jay Pritzker Pavilion, a bandshell with a stage framed by curving plates of stainless steel. It reminded me so much of the
Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, and I later discovered they were designed by the same architect, Frank Gehry.
After walking around the park, I continued walking north. I passed the Chicago River, and then met up with Tita Isa.
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| Many boat tours on the river |
Tita Isa and I had dinner together, then we headed to the
John Hancock Tower for drinks and dessert. They have a restaurant and a lounge (not sure which floor) that offers a view of the city. We walked around the lounge after; so pretty to see all the city lights from high up.
Tita Isa was super excited for me to see the
banyo. Haha. Apparently you can get a really nice view from inside.
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| (True enough, the view was nice) |
The next day Tita Isa and I headed to the
Sears Tower, which is actually now named the
Willis Tower. At 103 floors, it's the second tallest building in the Western Hemisphere (it was the tallest in the world when it was completed), and you get a clear view in all directions.
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| Mabuhay! |
We headed up to the observation deck, called the
Skydeck. It was an amazingly clear day when we visited, and we could see for miles! Here's the view of the South.
The view of the East, of massive Lake Michigan (one of the five Great Lakes).
Still the East, just zoomed into Millenium Park.
This is the view North. If you head straight North you'll hit Wisconsin.
On the West side they have the
Skydeck Ledge, which is a glass box that sticks out of the tower (much like a balcony). The whole box is made of glass and thus allows you to see through the floor to the street!
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