The Bean, Among Other Things

After living in Chicago for 2.5 months, we have finally made it downtown to do some sightseeing. Having a visitor and time off from school are great excuses to do some of these things, and it was actually much easier than we thought to get downtown. We rode the Metra commuter rail, which is just about 3 blocks from our apartment and a 15-minute ride to Millenium Park. After getting off at Millenium Park, we took the obligatory pictures at the giant bean. Even though I had been to Chicago before moving here, I had never seen the bean before.

Then we walked through Millenium Park and Grant Park to the Museum Campus. We had planned to go to the Shedd Aquarium, but the line was insanely long due to a new exhibit that had just opened, so we made the decision to explore the Field Museum instead. We stopped first for a snack by the lake.

Jesse got a short but much-needed nap while we went through a large exhibit about the Ancient Americas, the people of the Northwest Coast and the North American Indians. He woke up just in time to go inside the Pawnee Earth Lodge (picture below) and then go see some huge stuffed animals.

It was a fun day, and now that we've figured out how easy it is to get downtown with public transportation, we will probably do it again soon!