Still relaxed from my jacuzzi tub evening the night before, we checked out around 9am, and in hindsight, we should have left a lot earlier... the day got away from us big-time today! We filled up the gas tank and got yet another Sausage Biscuit from McDonalds before making our way south to Racine. I had the Garmin set up to take us to Windy Point lighthouse and then a local bakery, but, as we drove along, we missed the turn for the lighthouse, so we just continued on to the bakery. O&H Bakery came highly recommended from my boss, who lived in Chicago many (many) years ago, and I'm a sucker for a pastry!
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| Bakery Cases Full of Tasty Treats |
We had a lot of fun talking with the employees about the differences in pastries (what makes a Bismark a Bismark? What is a Pershing donut?) and about what a Kringle even is! We also chatted with some locals - one of whom was originally from Sebring, FL, about 3 hours south of where I live. As we were making our decisions on what to purchase, one of those locals tapped me on the shoulder and handed me a package; he'd purchased two of the most popular pastries for us! How sweet! He got us a Bavarian Cream Bismarck and a Cheese-Filled Glazed Triangle. On top of that, we also purchased a Cinnamon Roll Kringle and a plush Viking (named Ohlaf).
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| Photo Courtesy of O&H Bakery Website |
We took our treasures to go, and found a local beach and tried our goodies. First up, the Bavarian Cream was a heavy boy, full of thick cream (stop giggling) that was more like a true pastry cream than a vanilla pudding (which most places use these days, because it's cheaper). Hubby really liked it and after a bite or two, I let him finish up the whole thing.
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| Custard Filled Donut - Fudge Topped |
Next was the Cheese Triangle. The employees told us it was a yeast dough filled with a sweet cheese filling made with local Wisconsin cheese. I was expecting something along the lines of cheese danish flavors, or cheesecake flavors, but this was a little more tangy than that, kind of a greek yogurt taste/feel in the mouth. I was a little bummed about that, because if the filling had been sweeter, this would have been a grand slam... The glaze was light and sweet, the dough was springy and yeasty and chewy, but the filling was just a little off for me... I ended up eating as much of the unfilled part as I could, but skipped the filling area.
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| Cheese-Filled Glazed Triangle donut |
And the kringle itself? Light, flaky, super-tasty, but I don't think it's my thing... I liken the dough more to a baklava-style, with very thin sheets folded on itself over and over. I prefer yeasty over flaky, I guess! But the flavor was on point. I would just have preferred more chewiness, like a donut.
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| It's very...flat. I prefer fluffy pastries. |
Once we wiped down with some wet wipes (we were all sticky from the donuts), we hopped out and explored the shoreline. We tried to get as close as possible to the lake, taking silly photos, and one rogue wave came up and attacked our feet. Luckily, I'd Scotchguarded our shoes before we left; unlucky for Hubby, it doesn't work on mesh sneakers! I also picked up a few rocks (which apparently is my thing for this trip).
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| Lake Michigan Selfie! |
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| So different from yesterday |
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| No wet shoes for me! |
We then backtracked an went back to the actual stop, the Windy Point Lighthouse, and I'm happy we came back. It was really pretty!
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| Wind Point Lighthouse |
Out past the lighthouse was a lot of huge boulders leading down to the shorefront, and then some smaller rocks (yep, took some more).
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| This would make a great desktop background |
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| Hmmm, I wonder if coating these in poly would keep them this pretty? |
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| I'm gonna have to find out! |
Hubby and I walked around exploring, mostly him, really, because I was taking buttloads of pictures.
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| I took a bunch like this; it was my favorite, with the sunshine |
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| Boulders & Waves |
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| Accidental Renaissance™ |
From the corner of my eye, I saw him climb back up toward the lighthouse, so after I took a few more photos, I started to follow him, not really paying attention to my footing, and bam! My foot slid out from under me and I fell forward on my elbows on a ginormous boulder. I heard my camera hit the rock and when I looked down, all I saw were pieces!
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| Now how will I find a view? |
I laid there for a minute, assessing my physical damage, then started laughing. Hubby turned around and saw me face-down on a rock and the oh fuck, she hurt herself look on his face made my heart just melt... I could see the fear and concern openly on his face that I just wanted to give him a big hug! I told him I was fine, and pulled myself back up. My elbows hurt, but nothing was broken or bleeding, and it turned out that, after a full systems check, the only thing broken with my camera is that the lip of the viewfinder popped off, and I could snap it right back on. Oh, and of course, once Hubby knew I was fine, he made fun of me the rest of the trip!
Nothing hurt but my pride, we got back on the road and headed south to Chicago. I realized, far too late, that we'd not picked up a Wisconsin magnet, at about the time we crossed into Illinois.
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| Welcome to Illinois (ugh) |
So we turned around!
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| Welcome to Wisconsin (yay) |
Back in Wisconsin, we popped into Mars Cheese Castle, and wow... what a place!
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| The photo doesn't do it justice |
It's this huge store, and yes, shaped like a castle, full of All Things Wisconsin. Cheese, of course, but also meats, baked goods, jams, jellies, honey, candy, wine, souvenirs... even a café (closed that day, sadly, because of The Cooties). But my favorite room was the one dedicated to local sodas!
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| There was a creepy mouse-eating-cheese statue... |
We ended up picking up five bottles of soda, and two magnets, one of which was a bottle opener, in case we wanted to try any of the drinks before we got home. (ETA: We ended up trying all of the sodas when we got home <<I'll insert the link here later>>, but I can tell you that Point Premium and Sprecher Maple Root Beer were my two favorites, by a wide margin)
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| Sprecher Root Beer Sprecher Maple Root Beer Sprecher Ginger Ale Dang! That's Good Butterscotch Root Beer Point Premium Root Beer |
Once we left Wisconsin (again), and crossed into Illinois, we started seeing signs for something called an oasis. At first I thought it was just a rest area, but it was more like if a Florida Turnpike Plaza had a baby with a Mall Food Court.
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| You can see how it spans the entire interstate/toll road |
There is an entrance on each side, similar to the FL Turnpike ones, but these actually crossed over the entire interstate below it! You could stand in the middle and watch the traffic go by, which was really cool.
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| Inside, there are counters along the glass walls, so you watch traffic |
Inside were a lot of food choices, like Dunkin', Panda Express, Auntie Anne's, a popcorn place, a shawarma place, McDonald's, Sbarro's, and much more! There were vending machines, ATMs, bathrooms, crane games, and even a Best Buy vending machine for tech needs! Outside was a 7-Eleven for gas, too. Interesting to find out that the oases were paid for with a $95 million investment provided by Wilton Partners of LA, and ExxonMobil, in exchange for a 25-year lease (and has been the focal point of alleged political corruption). There is no cost to Illinois taxpayers!
We took advantage of the food court idea, and I picked up an overpriced slice of pizza from Sbarro, and Hubby picked up a Shamrock Oreo McFlurry.
Remember when I said that the day got away from us? Yeah... We didn't get to North Chicago until 3pm. And got stuck in rush-hour traffic.
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| I see it... way over there! |
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| Our very first El sighting! |
It took us almost an hour to get from the outskirts into downtown (I guess it's downtown?) We were aiming for the Daley Plaza area.
Following the Garmin (badly), we had to deal with crazy 4pm downtown traffic, and I could not for the life of me figure out where to go to access parking. It turned out that their parking garages were underground! Certain streets are called "Upper" or "Lower" depending on whether or not they were ground level, or underground. I just couldn't wrap my head around that! Oh, and people drive like crazy people down there, at least for my taste.
So, once we finally found parking garages, none of them were open! Every one we drove by had their roll-up doors shut! I couldn't understand why all of these places were closed, except to think that maybe they were full. We found an empty area to turn around in, and as we sat there, we saw a car pull up to a closed parking garage, and the door opened for them. Hmm, maybe they had a card key or something. But then it happened again. We quickly realized that garages kept their doors closed down here, and you had to drive up to open the door. At least, that's the assumption we went with.
Mystery solved, we found a place to park in the Millennium Garage at Randolph & Columbus, close to Daley Plaza.
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| The Official "Hey, Where'd We Park?" Photo |
Letting Hubby lead the way, we took the stairs up one level into a vestibule where the Pay Kiosks were, but when we walked out, we were still underground! I told him that we needed to take the elevator to the top level (which I assumed would be "ground level," but he didn't think so. There were switchback stairs nearby, so we climbed those up to ground level instead.
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| Those stairs on the right |
There was SO MUCH that was closed off, thanks to Mayor Beetlejuice Lightfoot. Most of the entrances from Columbus were locked with a chain, so we ended up doing what everyone else did - we just hopped a metal gate!
Up in Millennium Park, we made the mistake of looking for a bathroom. We walked down one side of Pritzker pavilion, then the other, only to be told that the only bathrooms available were fucking porta-potties. No thank you.
However, let me say this... Because of The Cooties, and Beetlejuice locking down her city, there were no crowds in the park, and I was able to get amazingly unpopulated photos around Cloud Gate (a.k.a. The Bean). It was surrounded by metal fencing all the way around, so I couldn't get really close, but that kept other people away too. The only thing that would have made it better is if the sun wash shining, but I still got some amazing photos.
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| Can you find us? |
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| I mean... it's a hard photo to get, and I got it! |
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| Pritzker Pavilion |
Traffic getting out of town, as you can imagine, was horrendous, on Lakeshore Drive. We detoured off Lakeshore because of an incoming fire truck, which worked out in our favor. Unfortunately, we still had to cross over the Chicago Skyway, which freaked Hubby out (he hates bridges!)
Outside of Chicago, we started our very long drive to Ohio. As warned by my boss, it was fuckin' WIMDY!
We stopped in Indiana and picked up snacks (and a magnet) at an interstate 7-Eleven. We had to drive through the entire top of Indiana, corner to corner!
At one point, during the planning of this trip, I saw how close we came to the Ohio/Michigan state line, and wanted to detour to add another state to our total, but as we left Chicago, I told Hubby that we were just going to skip it and drive straight to the hotel. I'm so bummed now, looking back, that we didn't do it! I mean, come on... look at the map! It would have only added 20 minutes to the total trip, and we could have gotten another magnet!
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| Tourist Regret... it's a thing |
But, alas, we didn't stop. And I think it was a detriment, because the drive was very dark, quiet, and boring. Sunset comes a lot earlier up here, so any time after 5pm, I assumed it was past bedtime! In Ohio, we picked up another magnet at another interstate 7-Eleven.
Because we were so late, it was too dark to appreciate the drive to Port Clinton, a little peninsula sticking into Lake Erie. Which sucked, because it was one of the main reasons I booked the place! I wanted to get some sunset photos over the lake, but no luck. We checked in and had barely unpacked before I fell into a sleep coma!
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| The Housekeeper left this awesome note in our room! |
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