Rockford to Chicago, Illinios (Wed 30.05.12 to Fri 01.06.12)

On Wednesday Richard went and met with some people about an hour out of Rockford to look at thier effluent systems.  I spent a quiet day at the hotel, it was nice to have some time out.
On Thursday Richard went out in the morning and looked at a farm an hour and a half out of Rockford.  I spent the morning re-arranging our bags.  In the afternoon we travelled to Rosemont, Chicago, which didn't take long but it was raining quite a bit and the traffic was quite heavy, so it was tough going.  Richard left me at the hotel and met with some Fonterra guys and travelled 6hrs NE of here to Cadallac, Michagan where he'd be looking at another farm on Friday.
On Friday I caught the train in to Chicago, and did a Hop-on, hop-off bus tour around the city centre.  I had a really good day seeing the sights, and doing some shopping.
I had to walk a couple of blocks to the train station, and the train took about 35 minutes to get to the city centre. Then I walked about three blocks to the Millenium Park where the bus tour started.  At the Millenium park they had this cool "bean".

I was one of the first on the first bus to get going this day, so got chatting to the tour guided, then he remembered me all day as being from New Zealand.  There were some other New Zealanders too, doing a driving tour similar to ours, but mostly doing Route 66.  The couple I talked to were from Reporoa but the tour was organised through the Beach Hop.  There were about 16 of them I think, driving Mustang Convertables like us!
The day started a bit cold and wet, but I still stayed up the top of the bus and saw the sights of Chicago.  I stopped off at the Navy Pier (which had shopping), Water Tower Mall (shopping), Hard Rock Cafe (a drink and more shopping) and the Sears Tower.
Went to the top of the Sears Tower (I think it might be called the Willis Tower now) to the Sky Deck.  Which is a bit like going to the top of the Sky Tower in Auckland, but probably about twice as tall.  The view was amazing.  By this time the weather had really cleared up.

Lake Michigan is in the background.

By the time I got back to the first stop again it was about 5pm.  We were lucky to get back to the same spot as they were closing off the streets because President Obama was coming to Cultural Art centre right there.  It was pretty amazing to see all the preparation just for him to drive in, he obviously never has to wait in traffic at all.  The streets were blocked off for miles, and this was at peak traffic time.  I thought I might be able to get a glimpse, but no such luck.  I just saw all the vehicles going past. There were police on motorbikes, black SUVs, white vans, a black car, and more motorbikes.

Personally I thought he was in the black car, but who knows.  You can see in the background the crowds that had gathered, and a bit of paparazzi as well.  A few people around me didn't know he was going to be in town, and were just annoyed they couldn't get across the street to get home or get to meetings.
I managed to find my way back to the train station and get back to the hotel okay.  Richard was already back and we had a fanastic dinner at the Steakhouse restaurant at the hotel.