Visiting the Chicago Bean

Chicago is famous for many things (pizza, the Magnificent Mile, the Bears). My oldest son was excited to see one thing--the Chicago Bean. I had not heard of this attraction. But we were making good time on our trip and decided to check it out as we drove by the Windy City. Driving into downtown was easy since the highways run right over to Lake Michigan.

View from the highway to Chicago

We followed our cell phone's directions to Millennium Park, where the Bean is located. On the way, we saw Soldier Field where the Chicago Bears play their home football games.

Soldier Field

We arrived in the neighborhood and my wife let me and the kids off at a nearby stoplight. A quick walk around the fence led us to the park entrance. A nice lady made sure that we were wearing masks, then we could enter the park. The park has a fountain and a formal garden and an ice-skating rink (it was too warm to be open). We ignored all that and headed straight to the Bean.

Us at the Bean (my daughter took the picture)

The official name of the Bean is Cloud Gate. Sir Anish Kapoor designed it and initially didn't like the nickname "The Bean." He was imitating liquid mercury and saw it as a gateway through which visitors could walk. The shape does have a hypnotic quality. The high polish on the 168 stainless steel plates shows no seams. The reflection is amazing and fun, distorting both the skyline and the visitors.

Cloud Gate with a warped skyline

Reflection of us on the sculpture

The skyline around the sculpture is beautiful, making the location ideal for interesting mirror effects.

A nice set of buildings

A view of the buildings behind the bean

According to descriptions, visitors used to be able to walk underneath the twelve-foot arch in the middle. Maybe we will have to visit again. It was not clear if the fences were up because of virus concerns or general safety of the sculpture. 

On our way out of town, we drove under another famous part of Chicago--the El. The elevated Metra train is part of the mass transit system. We saw a train go by earlier but not when we drove by.

The El

Travel Bug Adventures

We picked up the Travel Bug Hard Drive Travel’s out of Going West TB Hotel on our recent driving vacation to Minnesota. The geocache is located behind a truck stop in Indiana. The find was a little tricky--we had to go through a fence to what seemed like an abandoned road. You know, the sort of place where you would run into a zombie horde. All was quiet.

Hard Drive Travel's (sic)

TB Hotel location

When we discovered the bug’s destination, we thought we had to help out. This particular travel bug is trying to get to North Dakota, which happened to be part of our destination, visiting relatives and some family graves. Geocaching took us to a different cemetery in Geneso, North Dakota. We dropped the travel bug in Iron Wall - NDSQ and retrieved it from there because we were worried it might be a while before it moved on.

The cemetery gate with silos behind

Me and the bug

The cemetery

Our route back home happened to swing through the top of South Dakota. We couldn’t resist the urge to get another cache and another state. We found a cache, MGR Inspector Visits Claire City!, in Claire City, South Dakota. The small town’s park had the hiding spot. We took some pictures there after making the find. We again dropped and retrieved the travel bug so it could get the extra state in too!

Location of the South Dakota cache

The bug at same

On the way home, we stopped by a cache in Illinois (because we haven't cached in Illinois yet). The cache wasn't big enough to drop the bug in, so we gave it another visit at 11-11-11 #9.

The cache is somewhere in the picture

We got home and tried to drop the travel bug at All Hail the Queen but the cache was too small. We had some shopping to do anyway, so it wasn't a wasted trip.

The cache is somewhere around here, the back parking lot of the store

We went to a different parking lot where the cache Cats and Dogs and Fish Oh My! is located in pretty much the same hiding spot. The container was the same size, so the travel bug would not fit!

Even folding the plastic bag didn't help!

Then we couldn't even find Southbound Roach Motel, a cache specifically designed for travel bugs going south on Interstate 95. The cache location was behind some very tall grass (like four feet tall!). Hopefully the rest stop people will get their weed wackers out and take care of some business.

After that, we found O Christmas Tree! which claimed to be a regular-size cache. The container was big enough, but the space inside was not. It was a very fun container, so we'll give them a pass this time.

View from our parking spot

We finally found a cache big enough to fit the bug inside. We went to the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum which had the Horse high, bull strong and hog tight geocache. The title refers to Osage Orange, a bush that is often planted close together to make a fence. You know, one that is too high for a horse to jump, too solid for a bull to ram through, and too tight for a hog to slip through. At least the cache was accessible and now has a traveler ready to move on.

Somewhere in there

The park and museum are well worth visiting, even apart from the cool geocache in the front!