I have been back from my Chicago trip for a little over a week now, and it went very differently from what we had originaly planned...
So the main thing that changed was we made the trip just a one day thing instead of staying overnight so that we can save money. We had to try to include as much into one day as possible and spent a lot of the time trying to get around the city. We were able to go to most of the places we wanted to (French Market, Trump Tower, Lincoln Park Zoo, Chinatown), but added in a couple more new places too! We were surprised at how much we fit into one day.
Our train ride there was 1.5 hours late so that took even more time away from being in Chicago. I have no complaints about the ride there, except it was very cold.
The train station in Chicago, Chicago Union Station, is so huge! It was super nice too; there was Christmas decorations, a giant tree, and even the Polar Express! We were so amazed that we were probably in there exploring and admiring for like 10 minutes before we realized we were using up our time.
From the station we took a taxi to Trump Tower, big mistake. He drove super crazy and it was expensive too! After that ride we decided it would be best to take Ubers the rest of the day. The first thing we did in Chicago was flick off Trump Tower which was enjoyable.
Next, we checked out the famous bean sculpture...
From there we walked all the way to the French Market, a very long and cold walk. It felt like it at least lol; it was only a mile. The French Market was a super cool place. It was like a food court with a bunch of different types of food stands. They had macaroons ,sandwiches, pizza, tacos, fries, and more!
After eating lunch, we spent a while at the Museum of Science and industry; this is a must see if you are visiting Chicago! The different exhibits here were so awesome and there were many different types. They had a giant tornado, old cars, giant planes hanging from the ceiling, an old small town, and much more. My favorite exhibit was a Christmas one they had; there was a tree for each country decorated differently. Each tree was so unique and it was a really cool idea that allowed people to learn about different countries.
Then it was time to check out Chinatown. It had a bunch of restaurants and small shops. We did some shopping and found some cool souvenirs. We also got some candy from this cool place. They had coffee pudding, funnel cake flavored suckers, and Kit Kats in multiple flavors like raspberry, mint, cookies & cream, and dark chocolate!
We had seen online that Navy Pier looked super nice and cool so we went to check it out, we were sadly mistaken. Nobody was there and the ferris wheel was shut down. However, the city and water looked very nice at night.
There was also this Winter Wonderland thing going on inside this building along the pier, so we walked all the way to it just to find out it cost $28 to get in. We said no way and went to the Lincoln Park Zoo, which was free, and checked out the lights they had all over. It was really nice for being free! The only animal we got to see was a sleeping polar bear. After this we made it back to the train station for our 9:15 pm train with about 10 minutes to spare, or so we thought. When we came in the doors they announced that our train was about to leave, so we started running through the station trying to make it in time. We ended up running into this dude who was also trying to make it to our train, so we all ran to it together lol. Good times. We made it on the train super last minute. The ride back was very different. It was hot and there were interesting people. In front of us were two women possibly on crack. The one kept randomly knocking out and she was eating napkins. Then next to us was this girl who was super drunk and crying. We made it back to Toledo about 4 am. Overall the trip was very fun, we seen and experienced some pretty cool things, and we learned that next time we definitely want to stay the night!
