September 26-Friday, Chicago, IL

Got in around 2:00, a total of 2200 miles to get here. Staying at a Best Western downtown that feels like a European hotel, smallish, oldish, stately, reworked, etc. As with most cities, we love looking at the architecture, lots of art deco here. We WALKED (ah-bliss) to the Sears building and went up to the top floor, taking advantage of this beautiful weather---80 degrees, not a cloud in the sky.
We have really enjoyed the Garmin GPS we bought. We refer to it as 'her'. She's yelling at us! She wants us to make a U-turn as soon as possible! But she does direct us to our hotels with little trouble. Sometimes she has the hotel on the other side of the road, but we have been able to make allowances for her anomalies and get to our destination.

And Benny's comments:
Finally, we approach Chicago on inbound I-290 and we can see the Sears Tower from 20 miles away. We check into the Best Western River Front Inn, which is 5 blocks from the Chicago River front. The hotel is old, clunky, and tired. But, the on-site parking is free (a big deal in the big city) and we have a view—of a McDonald’s restaurant across the street. Our room is set back from the street about 50 feet but we can still hear the traffic.

We are immediately off to the Sears Tower and the “Skydeck”. It is fabulous. The air is a bit hazy, so we cannot see Michigan across the lake. But Chicago has no secrets from the Skydeck. You can see everything. We walk back from the Tower and have dinner at The Rainforest Café near our hotel. It is Friday evening and every family with screaming kids has brought them to the Rainforest Café for dinner. It is an upscale Chuck E Cheese. Sitting near us in the melee of hyperactive children shouting at the top of their lungs is a table with a single mother and her daughter and son. The son, about 6 years old, keeps putting his hands over his ears when he is not taking a bite of his dinner. At the table just behind us, some parents in their late twenties are trying to cajole their spoiled-brat daughter (about 4 years old) from under the table, where she retreated when told she could not have something she wanted from the menu.