A Day, A Week, Hemant, A Year

I think we would have preferred going on our honeymoon immediately after the wedding at the end of last September, but with Michelle being a teacher the earliest we could go was Christmas. So after changing our destination countless times we ended up deciding on the Mayan Riviera in Mexico. Since we were going during the dead of winter, the only stipulation was that our destination would be hot.

We booked two weeks at the Azul Sensatori, a 5-star joint about twenty minutes out of Cancun. The plan going in was to just play each day by ear, with an emphasis on being extremely lazy. Most vacations we’ve been on together have been jam-packed with activities which usually results in us coming back more exhausted than before we left. This was our honeymoon and we wanted it to be just that.

Our room was great with a beautiful ocean view, but after a 30 hour downpour right after we got there the bathroom flooded. Michelle’s legendary service industry negotiation skills were put into motion and we were promptly upgraded to the honeymoon suite with premium services for the rest of our stay. Not too shabby at all.

We spent the first few days mostly sleeping, watching TV, and eating due to the crazy rainfall. But once that cleared up the weather went back to normal and we were basking in the 30 degree temperatures. After a couple of days of just lounging by the pool or on the beach we decided that we should venture off of the resort.

We booked a day trip to visit the Coba Mayan Ruins and a traditional Mayan village. This tour sounded great on paper, but didn’t bode too well with Michelle and I. Don’t get me wrong, the ruins were impressive as to be expected, but the tour guide really liked to listen to herself speak. While at the ruins she took us to a couple monuments, spoke for about 15 minutes, and then gave us about five minutes to check it out on our own. Coba also has the only remaining pyramid you can climb and this was our experience.

• Tour Guide: Blah, blah, blah….. [repeat for 25 minutes]
• Tour Guide: Ok, now you guys can go climb the pyramid. You have 5 minutes to get up it. 5 minutes to take pictures. And five minutes to get back down.

The tour also included a trip to a traditional Mayan village where we would get a chance to spend some time with a couple of families. We were told we would have the opportunity to speak with them and ask them about their lifestyle, culture, etc. This actually turned out to be a very strange experience. The tour guide once again directed everything like a drill Sergent (”stand here and take a picture”), and everything seemed to be staged. When we walked into one yard a lady was making fresh tortillas outside. The process was explained to us and we were to then move on. I held back from the group so I could take some natural picture of the lady without a bunch of tourists standing around. But as soon as everyone got out of sight, the lady wrapped up the tortilla mixture, covered it up, and went inside. I didn’t get the photo was I was hoping to.

On Christmas Day we took a 90 minute walk down the beach to a nearby village Peurto Morelos. The beach was quite beautiful and was bustling with activity as families celebrated Christmas. Michelle and I explored the town and then grabbed a quick bite to eat where I had the fortunate opportunity to experience the hottest salsa I have ever had. I ranked it a 10 on the Hemant’s Scale of Hotness (the hottest ranking yet). For anyone that knows me, that’s hot.

The next few days we got into the most excellent habit of laying by the pool reading books and sipping delicious cocktails in between deciding where we should eat. It was a very difficult existence. I also noticed something very odd. My legs and shoulders started to feel funny…a burning sensation almost. I had never experienced this before and after a moment of confusion I realized that I was actually burning. I guess there’s a first time for everything. This prompted me to use sunscreen a little more often….at least while still in Mexico.

After days of sloth-like behaviour we decided that we should probably get out and about again. Once again we booked a tour that would take us snorkeling at the stunning Xel Ha and to explore the Mayan ruins of Tulum. We were hoping that our experience with our previous tour guide was just an anomaly, but that theory quickly came to an end. We started to feel like we were in a kindergarten class visiting the museum in some big city. Despite this we had a great time snorkeling in the waters of Xel Ha to experience all of the marine life that inhabit it.

Once we wrapped up there we made our way to Tulum to see the ruins and the beach made famous by the film The Blue Lagoon. The tour guide took us to an area of grass and started his speech that would last 45 minutes. Since we only had 75 minutes at the ruins I started to slowly inch my way away from him at about the 25 minute mark, until I was far enough away to go off on my own. Michelle wasn’t far behind. I guess the tour bus thing isn’t for us. We probably should have just rented a car and visited these sites on our own. You live and learn, I guess. Regardless, the grounds at Tulum were quite very cool and the many monuments that speckled its surface were intriguing. It’s too bad that everything is roped off now, preventing you from really exploring.

Michelle really wanted to go to Playa del Carmen so we organized that into one of our final days in Mexico. The real goal was to actually meet my sister and brother-in-law who happened to be in a nearby resort for the 10th Anniversary, but because of malfunctioning voicemail, it didn’t work out. We did get a chance however to experience Playa and some more extremely hot salsa.

Our honeymoon ended up being as we had envisioned it. A time for us to get away together and just chill out. It was awesome not having anything more pressing than deciding where we were going to eat dinner for two weeks. This is a lifestyle the two of us could really get used to. I didn’t take a lot of photos which is somewhat unlike me, but you can check out some of my favourites here.

Our wedding photographer Kira Nelson, has posted some of our photos from the day on her blog. You can see her blog post here and can see the slideshow here.

She has also posted all of the photos from the entire weekend festivities in a private gallery. If you are interested in seeing them please send me an email or comment in this post and I will send you the link and the password. This private gallery is where you can order prints if you wish.

This past weekend Michelle and I tied the knot. As my regular readers know we got engaged last year, and got to planning the event almost right away. Before we knew it the weekend of September 26th, 2009 arrived and the festivities were underway.

Friday night Michelle and I held a welcome event at our home. Since we had so many friends and family travelling from all over the world we thought it would be a good idea to have as many of them over as possible the night before just to catch up. We ended up having a very full house (and backyard) with over 100 people showing up. My mother and relatives were gracious enough to cook dinner for everyone, and I’m pretty sure no one left hungry. We wrapped things up at 11pm and I headed over to Curtis’s place to spend the night.

Saturday morning I woke up with a strange feeling in my gut. The funny thing was that I wasn’t sure if I was nervous or hungry. At around 11am I took my groomsmen out for breakfast. When we finished I deduced that I was in fact nervous since I was full, and still had the strange feeling in my gut. We headed back to Curtis’s condo to chill before the wedding ceremony.

We threw in the Goonies to help settle my nerves and at 2pm our photographer Kira Nelson showed up to take some shots of us getting ready. She didn’t spend too much time with us before heading back to our house to shoot the bridal party getting ready. Before we knew it, it was time to head over to the Broadway Theatre for the ceremony.

We ended up getting their a little early so the boys and I crossed the street for a drink at the Yard & Flagon. We figured it was a good way to kill some time, and to help take the edge off. After we finished up the time had arrived to get married. And married I got. The ceremony went perfectly.

Michelle and I decided a while ago that we didn’t want to take a big chunk of time to do photos. The plan was for the wedding party and Kira to walk from the Broadway Theatre to the Hilton and do photos along the way. Since the ceremony ended at around 4:30 and cocktails wrapped up 6:30, we would have plenty of time to get some great shots.

We arrived at the Hilton at around 6:15 to catch the tail end of cocktails. Dinner was served followed by the program. We kept it short with toasts to the groom and bride, as well as ‘welcome to the families’. I also prepared a slideshow (watch it below) which played just before Michelle and I addressed our guests.  The rest of the evening was spent dancing to a variety of great music.  I’ve always said that you can judge how good a wedding is based on how many people are dancing.  I’m happy to say that the dance floor was more-or-less full for the entire night.

It was great that the wedding went exactly as Michelle and I had envisioned. It meant a lot to have so many family and friends at our wedding. Some traveled from afar, and some from near, but one thing was for certain - the wedding would not have been the same without any of them.  Thank you to all.  Michelle and I will cherish this day for the rest of our lives.

Michelle and I had our wedding engagement shoot with Kira Nelson on July 28th at various locations in Saskatoon. We spent some time at the River Landing, and a few other unique downtown locations, and had a glass of wine in the downtown lounge Flint.

Kira recently made a short blog post talking about our shoot showcasing some of the great shots she took during the evening. You can read her post here and see a slideshow of all of our pictures here. I hope you enjoy them as much as we had getting them taken.

About five months ago Michelle and I were visiting the Fenrichs up at their cottage at Turtle Lake. I wasn’t feeling well so I just lazed around, mostly laying on the couch. Zoey and Molly, the Fenrich’s two dogs, must have thought I looked pretty comfortable sleeping there, so they jumped up on me and joined me.

Up until this point I had no real interest in getting a dog, but having those two dogs cuddle with me set something off. I knew Michelle was more of a cat person so I started bugging her that we should get a dog - specifically a Chihuahua. It actually started off as a joke, but a few weeks later I found out that Michelle had been talking with breeders. It seemed my joke actually gained some traction. The next thing I knew we were at a dog show in Saskatoon to meet some Chihuahuas from a breeder in Regina.

We officially made the decision to bring a dog into our house and started dealing with Rosalie Juravle-Clark of Happy Paws Dog Care in Regina. We really liked the integrity and philosophy of her breeding practices and knew that we would get a quality puppy from her.

Two weeks ago Michelle and I made a trip to Regina to meet the puppies. Even though they were only nine weeks along, neither of us could believe how small they were. We spent about an hour playing with the dogs before heading out. After some discussion we decided on a little male from the litter. Rosalie told us we could pick in two weeks.

And today we made a quick trip to Regina to pick up our new puppy. We were a little worried as to how he would behave in the two-and-a-half hour car ride to Saskatoon, but he had a grand ole’ time playing with Michelle the whole way back. He’s been with us for about eight hours now and has been a blast as he awkwardly runs and jumps around the house . So may I take this time to officially introduce you to Dragomir Chirpy Tiberius. That’s actually his registered name, so you can just call him Darwin.

You can see a few more shots of Darwin at my Flickr site by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

For those who have known me for a long time, it’s no secret that I used to be pretty engrossed in amateur astronomy. Back in 1990 I got a job specifically so I could buy a telescope, and after working full time for the entire summer I was able to purchase my dream scope. I used it pretty religiously for the remainder of high school, but once I got to university its usage dropped. And once I started my professional career it became non-existent.

Recently I started getting the itch to get back under the night sky and my telescope was sitting in the garage tempting me. I vowed a few weeks ago to start getting active in amateur astronomy once again. Luckily telescopes aren’t like computers that become obsolete after six months. My quality scope I bought almost twenty years ago may not have computer guided controls of today’s models, but its optics are still top notch.

Last night Michelle and I were out for a walk and I couldn’t help noticing the half moon in the clear night sky. I knew that Michelle had never viewed anything through a telescope before so I decided tonight was the night to fire it up. After cleaning a thick coat of dust off of the telescope I hauled it out to the backyard and aimed it at the moon. I fumbled a bit finding the controls, but it didn’t take long to get back into the groove. I centred the field of view on the bright moon, pulled it into focus and immediately remembered why I loved the night sky.

You can see more photos of Michelle and I under the night sky on my Flickr site by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

Michelle’s brother Christopher Parker married the love of his life Dazawray Landrie on Saturday, May 16th, 2009. The wedding ceremony was held at the Forestry Farm in Saskatoon. Things were looking pretty scary weather wise leading up to the wedding. The ceremony was being held outside and it was snowing regularly right up to the big day. As it turned out, the Saturday of the wedding turned out to be a great day.  Whew.

The wedding was short and sweet, followed by some mingling while a few key family photos were fired off. There was a few hours to kill before the reception which was being held out at Langham, SK - about 30 minutes outside of the city. Michelle was co-emcee for the reception so we grabbed a quick lunch and made our way out to Langham to get a few things organized.

The community hall where the reception was held was decorated beautifully. The wedding party, friends, and family did a great job of getting everything in order. Dinner was lasagna and Caesar salad, which was a little unprecedented, but delicious. I seriously believe that may have been the best lasagna I’ve ever had.

The dance followed the reception and a good portion of people stuck around until the end. Michelle and I are happy to say that we shut the thing down…as we do at most wedding we attend.  I didn’t bust out the moonwalk or worm this time around, but we did make use of our recently acquired ballroom dancing skills. We were waltzing like nobody’s business.

I fired off quite a few shots at the ceremony and a handful at the reception. You can check them out at my Flickr site by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

I never made another post following the wedding announcement back in September so I thought I would give a quick update. Michelle and I have gotten the major things sorted out including the venue for the reception, the photographer, and the DJ. The bridal party are ready to go with Michelle having found hers and the bridesmaid dresses. As far as I know they are all fitted and ordered. I too have found what the men will be wearing, but I’m pretty sure they have not went and got fitted yet.  I may have to give them a deadline. Michelle being the crafty person she is has been spending a lot of her time creating our invitations and ’save the dates’. We are going to have a lot of people needing to travel a reasonable distance for the wedding, so we figured ’save the dates’ would be a good idea. Michelle finished those up last night and will be mailing them out in the next couple days. Only expect one of these fabulous creations in the mail if you’re a traveler.  If you live close by, consider this your official ’save the date’.

I guess the last major thing Michelle and I keep ignoring is where the actual wedding ceremony will take place. We’ve found that when you’re not getting married in a church, your options become quite limited in Saskatoon - especially when weather could become a factor at the tail end of September. If you have any suggestions, we’d love to hear from you.

This past Tuesday night was very exciting for me.  I asked Michelle to marry me, and she accepted (like there was any doubt).  I’m sure most of you who are reading this have already heard the news, so I’ll just give you the details of the events leading up to the big moment.

A few weeks ago Michelle and her mom spent a few days in Edmonton at a lingerie trade show.  I saw this as my chance to go ring shopping.  I went to GMG Jewellers and explained to a salesperson what I wanted in my ring - a hybrid of my vision and what Michelle had hinted to me over the last few months. After looking at a few different designs, I made my decision and told them to go ahead and build it. I would return in a few weeks to pick it up.

The next day I told Ryan that I had just bought an engagement ring. Since Michelle’s birthday was coming up I thought that I would propose on that day. I wasn’t sure if this was a cheesy idea so I ran it by Ryan. He didn’t think it was, so the plan was set - I would propose on Wednesday, October 8th.

I was told the ring would be ready on September 17th. The day came and went without me picking it up. I didn’t want to get it too early fearing that I wouldn’t be able to stick to the plan. Another week passed, and September was coming to an end. I couldn’t take it anymore. I was too excited and picked up the ring on Tuesday, September 30th at lunch time, with the intention of doing it that night.

This was a busy week for us so it didn’t leave me many options. Tuesday nights we have ballroom dancing class and always go out for dinner afterward. We had previously agreed to go to a new Indian restaurant on 8th Street that night. However I had decided that I wanted to propose downtown along the river, and since 8th Street is nowhere near downtown I cleverly said that I was craving sushi and suggested the Samurai (which is right on the river). She agreed and my plan was underway.

While we were eating our sushi I kept mentioning how nice an evening it was and that we should go for a walk along the river, especially since we rarely do this. This is where my plan fell apart. Michelle was completely against a walk, stating that we needed to get home because she had a bunch of tests to mark. I tried to change her mind but was unsuccessful. I didn’t want to be too persistent because that would have been fishy (no pun intended).

As the conversation changed to Michelle’s trek up Mount Fuji while in Japan my mind was racing, desperately trying to concoct a contingency plan. Needless to say I still don’t know anything about her climb. I must have been pretty convincing since she didn’t suspect that I wasn’t listening to her.

After leaving the Samurai, and failing one more time to convince her to go for a walk, we made our way back home. The easy thing to do would have been to postpone the proposal. However I started the day telling myself that I would be engaged by the end of the night, and damn it, I was going to make it happen.

While Michelle was catching up on her email in the kitchen, I placed the ring in the middle of the bed, and dimmed the lights. I went to the kitchen and said that we should practice the dance we learned that evening. As we danced, I led her to the bedroom where her ring awaited her. The rest is now history.

See everyone next October.

Our flight back to Saskatoon was not until three o’clock which was a nice bonus. It’s rare that I don’t have an early morning flight. We were up relatively early and got all of our stuff packed up before heading back out to do some last minute shopping. Michelle wanted to find a dress for one of our many weddings this summer.

As it turned out the shops didn’t open until ten o’clock so we just killed time. Michelle tried on a few dresses at Anne Taylor which I thought looked pretty good. She said they were “mom” dresses and that they were something she would like in her closet about five years from now. After failing at the dress shopping we headed back to an Abercrombie & Fitch store where she picked up nice soft shirt. Their shirts are so soft.

It was getting close to noon so we decided to get back to the hotel and checkout. We jumped in a cab and were on our way to O’Hare International. This was where our trip really took a turn for the worse. Luckily it was at the end of it. After lining up at the Air Canada check-in at Terminal 2, we find out that our flight is being operated by United Airlines out of Terminal 1.

So we book it over to Terminal 1 and use their totally non-intuitive manual check-in system which no one can seem to figure out. We are then told that we are departing from Terminal 2. WTF? So we head back over to Terminal 2. We found our gate which had about five chairs in the waiting area.

We hadn’t eaten yet so we grabbed something at a McDonald’s in the terminal - the first thing that seemed to function efficiently. Our next mission was to find a Duty Free store. We were ready to give up after walking up and down the terminal twice. I then noticed a cart off to the side of a hallway with a sign “Duty Free Store”. Was this actually the Duty Free store in one of the biggest airports in the world? We bought a couple bottles of spirits and went to wait for our flight at a different gate (since ours had no seating).

Boarding time quickly approached so we headed back over to our gate to see a huge line. As it turned out they were loading three separate flights (with slightly different departure times) through the same gate. I’m not sure why United thought it was strange when people were nearly missing their flights as they were stuck at the end of this monstrous three plane queue.

Then we heard an announcement saying that you couldn’t line up until you had your passport checked by a United person. As more confusion filled the gate people started another line for a United lady to look at our passports and circle our name on the boarding passes.  WTF? No one was sure what this was accomplishing as we got back in line to board.

After being reprimanded by the gatekeeper that we were giving her too many documents when getting her to check our boarding pass, we were finally on our way to getting on the plane - or so we thought. We went down some stairs and were now out on the tarmac where we proceeded to walk for about five minutes to our plane which was likely back at Terminal 1.

We finally got onto the plane and I thought that this nightmare was over. Nope. As it turned out one baggage cart never arrived. Two people were sent on different occasions to get the cart but never returned. Finally after an hour of us sitting on the stifling hot airplane, the baggage manager found the cart and we were on our way. Brutal.

Despite having to deal with a flight attendant giving us misinformation about going through customs once we got to Winnipeg, the flight was pretty much normal. We touched down in Saskatoon where Jeffrey was waiting to give us a ride home.

As you can guess Michelle and I loved Chicago. I had heard so many people talk so highly of this city and now I know why. The waterfront is so beautifully developed and there is just so much to do. I always remember people saying that Chicago is what Toronto could have been. Now I know what they mean.

As a wrap-up, I just want to thank Yavini and Kevin for being so hospitable to Michelle and I for the few days we spent in St. Charles. It was awesome to spend time with them and the kids.  And now we are really  looking forward to our next trip to Chicago.  Having gotten through a lot of the touristy stuff on this trip we can focus on some of the more obscure gems that the city has to offer.

All of the photos from the trip can be seen in my Flickr account.

• Chicago - Day 2
• Chicago - Day 3
• Chicago - Day 4
• Chicago - Day 5
• Chicago - Day 6
• Chicago - Day 7

When I woke up Thursday morning I was absolutely starving so Michelle and I walked to a nearby restaurant for a nice outdoor breakfast.  While sitting at our table I noticed a familiar face being seated at the table next to ours.  Being a sports fan I immediately knew that this guy was Michael Wilbon, a famous sports personality for ESPN and the Washington Post.

From Wikipedia,

In his career, Wilbon has covered 10 different Summer and Winter Olympic Games for The Washington Post, every Super Bowl since 1987, nearly every Final Four since 1982 and each year’s NBA Finals since 1987.

He also co-hosts the sports talk show Pardon the Interruption (PTI) on ESPN.  Since I watch PTI fairly regularly and am a huge NBA fan, I thought this was pretty cool.  But since he was having breakfast, I didn’t want to bother him so I just got Michelle to take a picture of me with him in the background.  Here’s a shot of me Twittering that “I was having breakfast at the table next to Michael Wilbon”.  For those of you who don’t know him, he’s the guy behind me and on the left.

I’m not sure how many people actually recognized him, but near the end of our breakfast one couple approached him and let him know that, “PTI was their favourite show on TV”.   I still wasn’t comfortable with interrupting his breakfast with his two friends.

After breakfast we caught a city bus to what we thought was the general vicinity of the Sears Tower.  As it turned out, we got off of the bus a little too early and had to walk for almost thirty minutes.  You’d think you’d be able to see the tallest building in the continent from anywhere in the city, but when you’re downtown amongst so many other huge buildings, it’s easy to lose.

We finally got to the 110 story behemoth, showed our GoChicago cards, and got in line for the elevator that would take us up to the observation tower.  This attraction is usually lined up for hours, but since we were in the middle of the week, we were lucky to only have to wait for about ten minutes.  After watching a short History Channel movie about the tower, we rode the elevator to our destination.

The view from the top was pretty sweet.  It reminded me a lot of being at the top of the CN Tower in Toronto, but with Chicago being considerably larger, the sight was even more magnificent.  Michelle and I took some photos, and made our way around the observation deck before heading back down to ground level.

Since we had a pretty big breakfast, we decided to skip lunch and catch a bus to Navy Pier, a transformed family entertainment destination on Lake Michigan.  The first thing we did was inquire about the boat tours.  Our first choice was the Shoreline Architectural Tour of downtown via the Chicago River.  It was five minutes to three and luckily the next tour was at three.  Great!  We used our GoChicago cards to get our tickets and figured we’d just get on one of the boats directly behind the ticket station.  As it turned out we needed to make our way to the a different launch.  Once again we got into Amazing Race mode to catch the boat.

Needless to say, we made it in time and the tour was underway.  The one hour tour took us down the Chicago river through downtown while the guide explained many of the architectural wonders that line its shores.  Michelle and I both were incredibly impressed with the boat tour and would recommend anyone in the area to check it out.  It’s totally worth it.  The tour also revealed the origin of the city’s nickname “The Windy City”.  The name is not derived from the city’s apparent high velocity winds, but from of the “long winded” city officials who made their case to host the 1893 World’s Fair.

After the boat tour we walked along the entire pier, basking in the great views it offered.  There is a picturesque fifteen story ferris wheel on the pier which we figured we should ride.  Apparently this Ferris wheel replaced one that was built when Chicago hosted the 1893 World’s Fair.  Each car used to hold sixty people, had built in bar, and a live band.  How cool would that have been?

We were starting to get pretty hungry and tonight was our plan to have a nice dinner on the water.  None of the restaurants on the pier really fit into what we were looking for since they were all family oriented, so we caught a bus back into the heart of downtown.  Apparently during the boat tour, Michelle overheard a conversation about a restaurant called Fulton’s on he River that was supposed to be solid.  Surprisingly we were able to find it.

There was a thirty minute wait since we wanted to sit outside on the water so we were told to sit in the bar and they would come find us when the table was ready.  After inquiring with the hostess after nearly an hour had passed,  we found out that they thought we had left and gave our table away.  After that we were supposed to be next on the list.  Next we saw another party of two walk in and get seated after about two minutes.  Michelle approached the hostess.  It seems that this caught the attention of the head restaurant dude, so he swooped in and took control of the situation, seating us immediately and “taking care” of our drinks.

The rest of dinner was awesome.  The smallest steaks they had were 16oz.  As they say, “when in Rome”.  Something that I found pretty cool was after our waiter had explained  the items on the menu to us, he finished off with this statement - “And if you don’t like anything on the menu, the chef will make whatever you want”.  How awesome is that?  For the record I got the 16oz New York Strip and had no problem eating all of it.

After dinner we decided to go for a nightcap and dessert at the top of the John Hancock Building - Chicago’s third tallest building, known for it spectacular view of the city and America’s fastest elevator.  The view did live up to all of the hype, and looked extra impressive at night.  The funny thing is that the best view is from inside the lady’s washroom.  Michelle can vouch for that.  The men’s washroom had no windows.

You can see more photos from the day by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

Wednesday morning we were up by eight o’clock and out of the hotel shortly after nine.  The plan for today was to tour the Field Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago.  We decided to take a taxi to the Field Museum since it was out by the planetarium and aquarium, and we wanted to maximize our time.

The Field Museum was home to “Sue”, the world’s largest and most complete T-Rex skeleton.  We were also able to meet the Lions of Tsavo, the man-eating lions that were made famous in the movie, The Ghost and the Darkness.  The Egyptian exhibition was pretty cool as well.  It contained 23 mummies, and 5000 year old hieroglyphics.  There was also a full-size re-creation of a famous Egyptian tomb.  As cool as these were I think I enjoyed the Evolving Planet exhibition the most which let you walk through the evolution of the planet from prehistoric to present times.

Once we finished up at the Field Museum we took a walk along the shores of Lake Michigan to the Buckingham Fountain.  You may recognize it from the opening of the sitcom Married With Children.  We fired off a few photos, grabbed a hot dog, then continued our journey through Millennium Park.

Millennium Park is Chicago’s newest landmark.  This grand urban park is home to Frank Gehry’s distinctive Pritzker Music Pavilion and the Cloud Gate facade of curled metal in the shape of a bean.  This thing was pretty cool, but kind of weird as well.

There was also two large monoliths called the Crown Fountain covered entirely by changing projections as water fell down them.  Very interesting indeed.   It seems that Chicago residents use them to cool off during those hot summer days.  I would loved to have done this as well, but I didn’t really want to walk around the Art Institute of Chicago while being all wet.

After we finished our walk through the park we came up on the Art Institute of Chicago.  This building was massive and filled with all sorts of art.  The exhibit of the 68 Thorne Miniature Rooms was insane.  This Chicago socialite of the early 20th century seemed to have a lot of time on her hands.  The detail of the rooms was amazing.

The art from all corners of the globe were nice to see, but the two pieces I really wanted to view were the famous paintings American Gothic and Nighthawks.  Michelle and I were most interested in seeing the modern contemporary art galleries, but we had some bad luck since they were all temporarily closed.  Oh well, next time I guess.

When all was said and done at the Institute we walked back to the hotel to get ready for the evening.  We had bought tickets to the musical Wicked, a highly acclaimed show set in The Wizard of Oz universe.  The premise of the show is to explain what led the Wicked Witch of the West to become “wicked”.  It starts before and finishes shortly after the events of The Wizard of Oz.  Both of us thoroughly enjoyed the show.  It kind of reminded me of the story of Anakin Skywalker.   The show was at  the impressive Ford Center for the Performing Arts/Oriental Theatre.

After the show we wanted to just have a small bite to eat, and once again we found ourselves walking from restaurant to restaurant.  By the time we reached our hotel, we were both tired and decided to just call it a night.

You can see the rest of the photos from the day by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

Tuesday morning we were up early to catch the train to downtown Chicago.   My sister brought Chiara and Mira along when she drove us to the train station.  It was sad to leave the kids after our stay with them, but it was also exciting to be going to the city.  I’d heard so many good things about Chicago from so many different people that I was genuinely looking forward to our stay.

For some reason, the train showed up on the other side of the platform, so the whole lot of us waiting to go to the city had to race under the tracks and up to the other side.  Luckily we made it in time.  It felt like we were on the Amazing Race.  Once we were on, the rest of the ride went smoothly.  We arrived downtown in just over an hour and caught a taxi to our hotel - The Sofitel.

Even though we arrived much before their posted check-in time, we were able to get our room.  The hotel had a real trendy feel to it which I really liked.  The room was also quite nice, with the bathroom being totally awesome.  The bathroom alone was about the size of the rest of the room.  It had a separate tub, shower, and a toilet with a phone - for those really important calls.

Before leaving Saskatoon, we bought a couple GoChicago cards.  They each cost just under $100 and gave you admission to the majority of tourist attractions in Chicago.  Since we were planning on hitting at least two attractions per day, we would easily get our money’s worth.

We got our game plan together for the day before leaving the hotel.  We decided to focus our attention on Chicago’s Waterfront.  The Shedd Aquarium and the Adler Planetarium were the choices for the day.  Since our hotel was in the heart of downtown, and just off of Michigan Avenue, a.k.a. The Magnificent Mile, we decided to just hoof it to the waterfront.

After about an hour we approached the Shedd Aquarium.  With our GoChicago cards we had a special admission line which allowed us to bypass the regular admission line.  That was nice.  The aquarium had your basic stuff found in other aquariums, and we spent our time checking out all of the exotic fish, turtles, etc.  The aquarium also housed a couple Beluga whales, dolphins, penguins, and a large variety of sharks.  Due to some confusion, we didn’t get a chance to see the dolphin show from the presentation area, but we did get to see it from under the tank (which obviously is not as good).  We were going to stick around for the next show, but it was getting to be late in the afternoon, and we wanted to still hit the Adler Planetarium.

Luckily it was just a few hundred metres away so we didn’t waste much time getting there.  It was about four o’clock which would allow us to only see two shows.  Well as it turned out, our GoChicago cards only gave us admission to two of the shows per day anyway, so that worked out quite fine.  We saw The Night Sky Over Chicago and Cosmic Collisions which were both very good.  We ripped through the exhibits between the shows, but I would have liked to have spent a little more time there.  The planetarium was huge and you definitely would need a good chunk of the day to see everything.

It was just after six o’clock by the time we were done so we decided to spend the rest of the evening shopping on the Magnificent Mile.  I managed to buy a few things, but didn’t go overboard which I easily could have.  It was now past nine o’clock and we hadn’t eaten anything since lunch so we figured we’d better do something about that.

We passed tons of restaurants as we moved back towards the hotel.  We’d check out the menus, and even though they sounded good we’d just continue on.  Before we knew it we were back at our hotel and still hadn’t eaten.  We were now starving and the hotel’s menu didn’t do it for us.  We decided to head back to the last restaurant we saw, The Cheesecake Factory.  Michelle had eaten at one somewhere else and she said it was solid.

I ordered a hamburger and this thing was HUGE.  There’s no way I could have eaten this thing on a normal day, but since my stomach was now eating itself I was able to completely destroy the burger.  It also helped that it was delicious.  This burger has now moved to the number one spot on my Burger Delicious Metre.  I was even able to pack some delicious cheesecake into my gut for dessert.  By the time we got back to the hotel, my stomach was about to explode so it seemed best to go to call it a night.

On another note, the Apple Store is right on the Magnificent Mile and it was lined up every time we passed it.

I just don’t understand lining up to get into a store when there is no special release going on.

You can see more pictures from the day by following the links below.

• Thumbnails on Flickr
• Slideshow on Flickr

Monday my sister was back to work and the nanny was in to watch the kids, so Michelle and I thought that this would be a good opportunity to do some shopping while in St. Charles.  My sister works from home so she took a few minutes out of her day to drive us to an outdoor shopping mall called Geneva Commons.

Before we hit the stores we realized it was just after noon so we figured we’d better grab a bite to eat.  We went to a restaurant in the area and ordered from the lunch menu.  Wow.  I had forgotten how big meal sizes are in U.S. restaurants.  Neither of us were even close to finishing our meals.

There were a lot of great stores in the mall and we found a bunch of great prices on clothing, but we held off on buying anything since we were planning on shopping while in downtown Chicago.  With the U.S. and Canadian dollars being even right now, the considerably lower price of clothing in the States is really hard to pass by.

I was feeling quite parched since It was a super hot day again so we found a place to get a nice refreshing drink.  Many of you may know of Michelle’s great disdain for Starbucks.  She has vowed to never support this establishment.

She was not impressed that I took this picture.

On Sunday we decided to take the kids to the Kane County Fair.  It was raining in the morning, but by noon it had cleared up and the sun came out.  Once we got out to the fairgrounds we realized just how hot of a day it was.  It was in the mid 30s during the few hours we were out there, with almost no breeze.

We started off by taking the kids to the animal petting areas.  We saw a huge Flemish rabbit that looked more like a dog with floppy ears.  We also saw delicious steaks, bacon, veal, and chicken wings.  The kids really liked petting and feeding the animals.  I really liked the thought of eating them.  Mira got a bit of a scare when she was pushed down by a couple of goats who then proceeded to steal the feed we bought for her.  The look of shock on her face remained for about five minutes, but she regained her courage and started mingling with the animals again.

We spent the remainder of the time taking the kids on the rides.  I only went on one, and since I’m not really a “ride” type of person, that was enough for me.  I can’t remember what it was called, but I think it is called the “Himalaya” at the Saskatoon Ex.  I’m pretty sure I have bruised ribs from it…maybe broken.

After we got back to the house we took it pretty easy.  We spent a little time playing with the kids outside, so it seemed like a good opportunity to pull out my big camera and take some pictures.  I was firing them off left and right.  Boy, these shots were going to be fabulous.  After about twenty minutes I realized I didn’t have a memory card in the camera.  Brutal.  At this moment I put a card in and started taking pictures again - treating my previous blunder as a practice session.

By the end of the day everyone was pretty tired and found comfort in their own way.

You can see more pictures from the day by following the links below.

• Thumbnails
• Slideshow