Right, got up early and on the road by half past 7. Not a bad a drive, the bit we thought was going to be bad and had taken us over an hour to get through on the way to Kentucky took us 20 minutes at a steady 30 to 40 mph this time. However, just short of the airport (where we were dropping off the car) we got stuck. Never did completely stop and sit thankfully, but did go very very slowly. Never did find out what caused the back up.<\/p>\n
Managed to meet up with Dad and Eric and drove back the way we’d just come in to get to Eric and Karen’s house. Nice place in a really nice little village outside Chicago. As Eric drove us to the house we got taken around the town for a short tour. We visited for a bit before heading out to walk along the river side walk into town, stopping at places for drinks and window shopping. Nice relaxing evening watching baseball is the bar trying local beer and food. Joe is enjoying all the sports while I’m bored. So it goes.<\/p>\n
Dad and Mary Anne were up early to catch their plane so they all went to the airport. When Karen and Eric got back we headed for the station to catch the train into Chicago. We have now walked quite a bit of downtown Chicago but still haven’t seen much of the city! Lovely architecture, fun parks, and quite a lot to take in. We just walked and looked at things; saw the parks and outdoor sculptures. Quite a lovely city. We went to the Hancock Centre, third tallest building in Chicago. The observation deck costs to go up but we headed for the Signature Bar where you get the view for the cost of an expensive drink. It was quite crowded but we finally got a seat right by the window; however they never came to take our order so after we had a good look at the view and Joe got a few photos we left. Realised we had only a few minutes to catch the next train and the one after that was 2 hours later so Eric grabbed a cab and off we went to Union Station.<\/p>\n
Tonight is probably a quiet night in chilling and visiting. Tomorrow Joe and I brave the city on our own.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Right, got up early and on the road by half past 7. Not a bad a drive, the bit we thought was going to be bad and had taken us over an hour to get through on the way to Kentucky took us 20 minutes at a steady 30 to 40 mph this time. However, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4T97-w","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4252,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2023\/12\/10\/the-capital\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":0},"title":"The Capital","date":"Sunday, 10 December 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"After a small breakfast we headed out for the last day with the car and went to San Sebastian. Twisty drive (mind you, every drive is twisty - there will be one of those twists for 1.5km signs and 1.5kms later there's another one). Drove through the city to the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Travel"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4247,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2023\/12\/09\/cant-see-the-birds-for-the-trees\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":1},"title":"Can’t see the birds for the trees","date":"Saturday, 9 December 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Up earlier this morning and breakfast by 7 - sat on the terrace and watched the sun come up while drinking coffee which is a lovely way to start the day. We'd loaded up the car before breakfast so once that was done we headed out. We aimed for Las\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Frog Blog"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/tree-scaled.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":326,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2009\/12\/31\/vroom-vroom\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":2},"title":"Vroom Vroom","date":"Thursday, 31 December 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Up before dawn again and out on the road by 6. Stopped for a few photos but mainly just went for Racetrack Road. Saw several different ecologies on the drive up to the Playa - started with the usual salt tolerant plants, then a few cacti and a few more,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Frog Blog"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":269,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2009\/06\/14\/loch-awe\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":3},"title":"Loch Awe","date":"Sunday, 14 June 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Saturday 13 June So got into Glasgow and started trying to find how to get to the airport - hired the car from the airport so we wouldn't have to drive through Glasgow! After running about looking for the bus stop, we finally found it, just as the bus drove\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Frog Blog"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":374,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2010\/06\/12\/off-to-slimbridge\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":4},"title":"Off to Slimbridge","date":"Saturday, 12 June 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"So, Joe is doing a photography day at Slimbridge on Tuesday so we had to hire a car. Since we were going to have a car we decided to take the weekend and have a look around. I thought somewhere near Slimbridge to be there for Tuesday and have a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Travel"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":532,"url":"https:\/\/www.purple-penguin.org\/blog\/2013\/07\/03\/beachcombing\/","url_meta":{"origin":32,"position":5},"title":"Beachcombing","date":"Wednesday, 3 July 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"So to me beachcombing is walking along a sandy beach looking for shells. I said this to Joe and he said\u00a0 but we are looking for shells. Just they're a couple hundred million years old and they're in rocks on rocky beaches! Yeah, all rock beaches is just weird. 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