Tuesday, May 29th

We spent all of Monday driving in (we left around 8:30 am and got into downtown Chicago around 6:00 p.m.) Not too bad, and the kids were great in the car. All we did when we got there was unload the car, check in to the hotel and eat some dinner in the restaurant of our hotel. Then it was bedtime, because Tuesday was a huge day!

Tuesday was our first full day of vacation in the city. We got up early, walked across the street and hopped on a city bus that took us to the "museum campus" a place right on the lake that houses the Shedd Aquarium, Field Museum of Natural History and Adler Planetarium. Our plan was to spend the morning/lunch time at the Aquarium, then go to the Planetarium until it closed. So, that's what we set out to do. The kids loved riding the bus, by the way. They got to be real pros at public tranportation by the end of the vacation!

Some fun pictures of our morning at the Aquarium. They had some great exhibits. We got to see an exotic jellyfish exhibit and lots of neat fish.

We ate lunch on the patio outside at the Aquarium, and this was our view. A spectacular view of the Chicago skyline. I took lots of pictures.

The kids sitting out front of the Aquarium. Loved the view. I have a picture of my friends and I one spring break sitting on this exact ledge. I couldn't resist taking a pic of the kids there, too!

More pictures of them with the skyline behind. It was the first day and I was photo happy. Great pictures, though!

We walked over to the planetarium. This was the only place on our trip that wasn't super packed and over-crowded. We had a good time here, there were lots of interactive exhibits for the kids and of course, they love all things space. This picture is of a lady who was creating a vacuum with a machine and showing what ordinary things do when put in a vacuum. The kids thought it was fascinating!

 Grace must have been pretty tired. She fell alseep during our 3-D Imax movie about space junk.

 Daddy and the kids in front of the Gemini 12, a spacecraft that went into space with Buzz Aldrin and James Lovell.

 We didn't realize this, but the Planetarium closed at 4 p.m. Since we had decided to go straight to dinner and 4 was too early to go, we decided to walk around a little bit. Right next to the Planetarium, is a little stretch of beach and since the weather was gorgeous, we took of our shoes and socks and walked around on the beach. Of course, the water was freezing, but it was fun to sit on a beach for a while. We hopped on a bus and then the El (subway) to go to Rainforest Cafe for dinner. Incidentally, there was a fire that shut down a huge part of the subway system that afternoon, so our trip on the subway was unusual in that it was super crowded (rush hour!) and people were trying to compensate for the closings and the trains that were running were late. The kids were a little wide-eyed on that trip, but luckily we only had to ride for 5 stops and none of our stops were affected by the fire.

 Dinner at Rainforst Cafe was good, expensive, but good. Here is a picture of our dessert, a huge brownie volcano. The kids at it up!

The Sears Tower from our hotel roof. About 5 blocks away!

As if the day wasn't enough, it was early, about 6:30 when we got back to the hotel and the kids wanted to go swimming. The hotel pool was on the roof, so it actually wasn't too cold in the water, but the air was starting to cool off. They didn't care. They swam for about 45 mins anyway. Who has that much energy? They were exhausted when they finally piled into bed around 8:15. Another long day was ahead!