Chicago, IL

Every night Megs and I have dinner together and use that time to take stock of what is in store for the next few days. We figure out where we are headed and if we need to make reservations for any places to stay or tours that we want to take. And we talk about what we are going to do the next day. How are we going to get into a city, directions, figure out the transit if there is one, etc. And so far, all our plans have worked out pretty darn well…




Until today.



The plan for today was to get into the city early and do an Architecture Tour or something, before heading to Wrigley Field for a 1:20pm baseball game of the Chicago Cubs vs. the Atlanta Braves. Then after the game we could do a bit more sightseeing before heading back. This all would be possible because the Walmart parking lot we are staying in is very close to a commuter train station. Perfect right??



Well… We got up early as planned and over to the train station by 8am. The station was deserted…

This probably should have tipped us off… But we were under the assumption that trains came basically every half hour and that we probably just missed the 8am train. So we waited… 8:30am. No train. A freight train goes by though. And a passenger train went by in the other direction. However, it did not stop… This should have been our second tipoff.



8:45am. I call Sara to see if she can get online and double check the schedule for us. She finds it and tells us it says that on Sundays the train only runs every 2 hours and that the next train will be coming at 9:19am. At the same time, Megs calls the train company and the lady tells her the same thing, except that the next train was due at 8:56am… Strange. But ok.



8:57am. A passenger train comes and whizzes by without stopping. Awesome. Maybe what Sara found was right… Nope. 9:19am. No train but another freight train.



So by this point it had been about an hour and a half. No train. No other potential passengers. Discouraged, we decide to head back to the RV to regroup. On the way down to the street we pass by something we hadn’t seen on the way up… A schedule.



No stops at this station on Sundays.



Oye.



But we regrouped! We found the offsite parking lot for weekend Cubs games and it wasn’t too far. Had to pay for two spots, but at least we had parking and a free shuttle to the park… FYI, if you happen to be visiting Chicago on a weekend game day, it is definitely not a terrible idea to park in the lot and take the shuttle in. You can do it even without game tickets, and then just jump on the metro by the ballpark, which will take you wherever you’d like to go…



So at about 11:30am, we had finally arrived at the ballpark! And we are immediately greeted by this…

A giant noodle. No idea why it is there. But the ballpark itself was worthy of a photo too…

Gametime, though, wasn’t until 1:20pm. So onto the metro and straight into downtown Chicago for a quick little walking loop and to find the tourism visitor’s center…

Such an awesome city!! It’s vibrant and full of great architecture and city planning. We got ourselves excited for our big day of sightseeing tomorrow!

We found the visitor center, got our maps and guides, then hopped back on the metro, and were in our seats before the first inning was over! Wrigley Field!!!

Really neat ballpark. Could really feel the history…

I got a kick out of the old school scoreboard that is operated by hand…

And check it out! They put bleachers on the rooftops of the buildings surrounding the stadium! Genius!

After the first few innings, the game wasn’t going so well for the Cubbies. But, this beer guy was pretty entertaining. He had ninja beer serving skills that we had never seen before…

So after nine innings, 2 ballpark dogs, 1 batch of nachos, and 2 pints of Old Style beer, the Cubbies were destroyed by a score of 16 to 5…

Rumor had it that this was Lou Pinella’s last home game as manager. Well, regardless, it was a great time. I’m glad that I’ve now had the opportunity to see a game in two of the three great ballparks in baseball history. Too bad the Yankees are idiots and tore theirs down… Dumbies.

We found our way back to the RV, eventually, and I spent the rest of the evening getting myself caught up. Also, we discovered that tomorrow is going to be a Monday. Commuter trains run on Mondays!



Looks like we’re back in the game!!!