DAY SEVEN: Thursday September 14th Ann Arbour MI to Chicago IL

I set out at around 8.45am from the Red Roof Inn and cruise around Ann Arbour looking for a parking space to grab a Starbucks for breakfast, but find none free. So I carry on through the town, past the UMICH stadium to join the I84 for the cross-state drive to the I90 and on to the city of Chicago, Illinois.
 
‘It’s 246 miles to Chicago; I have some cigarettes; it’s grey; and I am not wearing sunglasses … Hit it,’ As the Blue Brothers would not be saying!
 
There are lots of roadworks on the I84 but no real delays, I just need to slow down from 70mph to 60mph to keep up with the trucks. There are also no speed cameras on the interstate but plenty of police waiting to pounce, so I keep my cruise control on unless overtaking. I had learnt that lesson on a road trip in California a few years earlier. Then I had been stopped by the blues and twos of a highway patrol – CHiPS! – on a completely clear stretch of interstate going downhill, having been clocked doing over 100mph. I was actually gobsmacked that the tank-like Oldsmobile saloon I was driving could actually go that fast and had been distracted from keeping an eye on the speedo by the conversations of my passengers. At least that is what I told the sunglasses and cap that invaded my driver-side window, eyeing the scene in the car, as they asked to see my ID. The very severe highway patrolman was not put off by the fact that I was a foreign tourist driving a hire car and, after a lecture telling me that I was going “too damn fast”, punctuated by the giggles of my unhelpful back seat passenger, he wrote me out a speeding ticket. This was – somehow – my first in any country where I have been driving. Handing it over, the policeman impressed on me that at the speed I had been driving he could quite rightly have taken me straight off to jail and stressed that I must comply with the conditions of the ticket which would provide me with a court hearing date at which, if I could not attend, I would need to plead over an internet link. He added that if I ignored this, I could find myself barred from entering the United States of America in the future as an undischarged felon. The lecture did its job – and stopped the giggler in the back seat. I made sure I complied with the instructions on the ticket, pleaded guilty in absentia online and paid my hefty fine of around $450. Lesson learned.    
 
Once past Kalamazoo, which seems a surprisingly big place, I decide to stop for a toilet break and a late brunch of a MacDonald’s quarterpounder and coffee at around 10.45am. There are still 120 miles to go to Chicago. As I make way back onto the interstate and continue my journey, I notice there are a lot of firework outlet shops around the area, each vying to be the biggest in the world. There are a lot of wineries too, being close to Lake Michigan, and an advert for one brand, Red Heron, grabs my attention near the Indiana state border. So I turn off to sample some at a St Julian winery outlet near Union Pier. Red Heron itself turns out to be nastily sweet, but there is an OK Merlot which I buy to take home for my wine-loving Dad, and I also get a bottle of Riesling which I’ll take to my Belarussian friends, Vladek and Irina, who will be my hosts when I reach Oregon.
 
I think of taking a detour to drive through the Dunes State Park just to get my first view of Lake Michigan, however as you need to purchase a permit I decide instead to just head back onto the interstate and wait for Chicago to see the lake. Driving through the brief bit of Indiana which borders the lake I pass Gary, a big steel town which was a key material for the railroads which converge in the Midwest. Joining the ubiquitous I90 once again I get my first glimpse of Lake Michigan and the impressive skyline of the Windy City in the distance. Just 25 miles to go.
 
There is inevitably a build-up of traffic as the interstate bisects the city. I am anxious looking for the Ohio Street turn-off as the exits come up thick and fast. But I find it easily and within five minutes I have managed to find the hotel I have pre-booked – the Best Western Inn of Chicago. It is slap-bang in the best bit of downtown, the Millionaires Mile, a block away from Michigan Avenue and all the posh shops. I manage to park the car just a block away at a garage with concessions for the hotel’s guests costing just $26 a day. Check-in is very smooth and after a freshen up I head straight out to sample the delights of the USA’s third-biggest city.
 
I had seen a poster advertising a King Tutankhamun exhibition from Egypt at the Field Museum of Natural History, so I head across town to go and visit that. On the way I check out a nearby Loewe’s cinema to see what is on for later, but there is nothing I really fancy seeing. I also swing through a Virgin Music store spotting a new John Mayer CD among other attractions which I vow to get later. Heading down Michigan Avenue I pass the posh shops and marvel at the Wrigley Building and waterfront as I cross the bridge over the Chicago River. Making for the Millenium Park, I check out the Pritzker Pavilion bandshell where I see there is a free concert by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra later.
 
I walk through the park and past the Chicago Art Institute heading down to Lakeside and get my first close-up glimpse of Lake Michigan. I can see the Field building in the distance at the Museum campus on the lake front together with the Shed Aquarium, Adler Planetarium and Soldier Field, home to the Chicago Bears NFL team. I still haven’t seen the city’s tallest building – and for a time the tallest building in the world – the black skyscraper, topped by white aerials known as the Sears Tower. But as I walk down to the Marina and look back to the Downtown loop there it is, poking out from behind the city’s other minor skyscrapers – how could it be missed.
 
I reach the Field around 3.30pm after around a three mile walk from the hotel and pay $25 for an exhibition admission ticket. It’s fine, well-organised and interesting, but it lacks the real excitement – the famous King Tut mask which is not allowed to leave the Cairo museum. Exiting through the giftshop – as always – I buy my niece Bethany a garish King Tut bear and then head into the museum proper. I marvel at Sue, the most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex fossil skeleton, found in South Dakota in 1990. Popping into the main museum gift shop to buy a guidebook and map of Chicago I also find an account of the Maneaters of Tsavo, a story about the killing of two lions in Kenya in the 1890s who had been preying on railway workers. I remember seeing a movie about the events in the 1990s called The Ghost and the Darkness with Michael Douglas as the hunter engaged to kill the lions who had pounced on around 30 workers. It turns out the taxidermy lions are here at the Field, having been sold for the princely sum of $5,000 in the 1920’s by the Brit who shot them. I seek them out, but they don’t look too scary stuffed!
 
Heading out of the museum I take a walk up and around the Planetarium to see more of the lake and get some good views back to the City skyline. I see lots of police and soldiers around a statue to Polish General Tadeusz Kosciuszko, a revolutionary hero in his own country who also fought with Washington’s Continental Army in the American War of Independence. It must be some anniversary, I guess, but don’t stop to find out more.
 
Walking back under the underpass to Michigan Avenue I decide to try and view the Sears Tower Skydeck. I head along Michigan to Van Buren Street and head west up into the Loop, following the elevated railway line. I am excited to get my first sight of the iconic trains on the tracks rattling above my head – sounding just like in the Blues Brothers movie. I stop off at the Billy Goat bar for a refreshing lager to help my journey as it is still pretty warm on the streets. Making it to the Sears I buy a ticket for the lift which whisks me up the 103 floors in just one minute, during which time my ears pop – twice! The Skydeck is fully enclosed in glass but has some great 360-degree views. It is perfect timing too as the sun is just setting to the west, behind the city, so I can get both great dusk and night photos as the metropolis lights up. At the gift ship I buy a tacky souvenir – a Sears Tower shaped pencil sharpener – plus some postcards and a Cubs baseball cap that I can wear for the game tomorrow. A trip to Wrigley Field was a prerequisite of my visit to Chicago.
 
From the tower I head down Jackson Boulevard back towards the Millenium Park, stopping to admire some great light fountains and the reflective sculpture known as the Coffee Bean. Walking back along Michigan Avenue I decide to stop and have dinner at a bar and grill, consuming some fully-loaded potato skins and chicken quesadillas washed down with two Sam Adams Lagers while watching some baseball – perfect. After dinner I stop off at the Virgin Records to buy the CDs I had eyed up earlier and finally get back to my hotel at 10pm. I am pretty knackered after a fair amount of walking, having spent a lot of time stuck in a car for the past few days. I give Vladek in Oregon a call to tell him I am on the way. I will leave the Blues Club visit to tomorrow night. Car mileage at end of day: 3,650.