Sunday, November 24, 2002
The party next door ended about 3 a.m., so we had a least a few hours of sound sleep, for which we were sincerely thankful. We nibbled some of the leftover rolls from Saturday’s lunch to stave off the hunger pangs for a while and took a walk around the neighborhood. I was surprised by a pocket park that we found on our route and we naturally wandered through it. I took some nice pictures of the sun rising behind some light fluffy clouds. So we got back about an hour later and felt a lot better for the exercise.
We connected with Martin and Jen for a really great breakfast at a nearby pancake house. I had a waffle covered with blueberries and a decent part of Monika’s really huge asparagus omelet (hey, she ordered it, not me!). Afterwards we drove straight downtown on I-55 to the Shedd Acquarium and spent several wonderful hours looking at fish tanks and watching a really nice dolphin show. The dolphins were a type of Pacific dolphin that I had never seen in a show before—they were pure white on their sides with one sleek black stripe down their sides—really pretty. We had a try at identifying a particular dolphin that had a curved dorsal fin and really tiny rear flippers from three others, and with Martin’s help I got it right (number 3!).
The tanks were filled with a wild variety of fish from a wide variety of habitats. The dim lighting made taking pictures without flash really difficult but some were obligingly hovering in the water for me. They had a nice exhibit on seahorses next to the dolphin tank, and fortunately they didn’t move too fast! The weirdest fish was one that used protective camouflage by mimicking the appearance of the kelp in which it lived. The fish looked so much like the kelp that after I took the picture I really couldn’t see where the kelp left off and the fish began!
From the aquarium we drove north to Navy Pier, which was transformed some time in the last half-century into a kind of mall plus amusement park. It was too cold to take the giant Ferris wheel outside, but we walked through the inside mall sections to take a gander at the variety of exhibits and boutiques. The most astonishing thing was an extensive collection of stained glass that lined the hallway almost out to the end of the pier. Chicago had been, apparently, a hotbed of stained glass artistry since the time of rebuilding after the great 1870 fire. Although the total was down from over 30 studios around 1900, stained glass panels were still manufactured in the city. The exhibit ended in an exhibit of some of the best work of the Tiffany studios, which was really impressive. I enjoyed most some of the mythological work while Jen preferred some of the pattern-based pieces, but we all found something we liked.
We ended our day with a late lunch at a bar and grill on the pier, and took a couple of family photographs on our way out. Martin and Jen dropped us off at the motel. We gave them a case of drinking glasses to use at the coop and asked them to say “Hi” for us. Then they continued on their way south to Urbana. We downloaded the pictures and took a quick peek at them before watching the news and “The Santa Clause” on TV—it certainly was a good antidote to all the bad news on the newscast! We also used our computer with the Streets and Maps software to check the way to Debbie’s in Buffalo Grove for the morrow before heading for bed.
Copyright 2002 by Robert W. Holt