Chicago, Illinois
The show starts…
Why we were there: 57th Street Art Fair
When we were there: June 2025
Where did we go:
This is our second time to Chicago. This time we stopped at a few road trip spots on the way up. Because we were visiting on graduation weekend the hotel were stupid expensive. We made the decision to stay at a hotel in Indiana and take the rail in to downtown Chicago. It was so easy! Then we were able to drive 20 minutes to the show in Hyde Park each morning, where parking is free, on street, and plentiful.
The first stop was the Cahokia Mounds World Heritage Site and State Historic Park in Illinois just to the west of St. Louis. Unfortunately the vistor center will be closed for the remainder of 2025 for renovations, but we were able to take the scenic staircase self guided tour to the top of the largest mound, Monk’s Mound, and finished our tour with a ride down the road to Woodhenge, a recreated wooden solar circle.
From their website: ”The Cahokia Mounds Site is the largest pre-Columbian site north of Mexico. At its peak, around 1100, this metropolis stretched over 4,000 acres, encompassed about 120 earthen mounds, and hosted a population of nearly 20,000 individuals – larger than London at that time. The State of Illinois now protects roughly 2,200 acres of the central portion of the Site. Including 72 of the nearly 80 remaining mounds, as some mounds are situated in unprotected portions of the Site.”
After this we drove around the corner to view the World’s Largest Catsup Bottle. Of course, you would too!
Our third stop was at the Crazy 80’s Car Museum. This was Fantastic! Blake heard of this place via a friend on his Mastadon weird car server. If you know Blake, you know he has a thing for 1980 cars. This museum is run by two locals who have carefully collected restored 1980s cars, vans, and grocery store kiddie rides. You can read more about them here and follow the museum on facebook. Check out our pictures below.
Once in Chicago, we joined our son and his husband for a day at the Art Institute of Chicago. We visited so many works of art, it is hard to sum it up. This is the type of museum that must be visited over and over again with a membership. I posted a just few photos of my favorite pieces from the hundreds we saw. The Georgia O’Keeffe piece was a particular joy for me. It was in a fairly quite stairwell and felt like a breath out. Something we all need. I bought a tiny postcard of it and pinned it to my wall at home, but sometimes size does matter.
Things on our list for next time:
Still have not seen the Field Museum which has the most artifacts from the 1893 Worlds Columbian Exposition. And still working on convincing Blake to take part in a mobster gangster murder mayhem ghost tour!
Snapshots:
