Chicago – July 2018 – Weekend in the City

With a chance to spend a couple of nights in Chicago, we went without any specific plans. Once we arrived in town late Saturday afternoon we headed out for a walk.

Our first stop was the beautiful marquee for the Chicago Theater on State Street.

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While Chicago is known for the El trains there are a couple that are underground downtown, including the Red Line.

The entrance to the subway station has a great art deco look to it – backed up by a mural of Muddy Waters!

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State Street had a number of public art features – this one backed by the former Marshall Field Department store clock.

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As we made our way to Millennium Park we heard music.

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And were pleasantly surprised to find a symphony playing music from Lerner and Loewe movies.

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On our walk back we had the fortuitous timing to be crossing the Michigan Avenue bridge just as fireworks started from the Navy Pier.

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The view down the river framed the fireworks with the buildings.

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The next morning we took a 4 mile walk up through River North and Rush Street.

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Stopping at North Avenue Beach.

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Our walk continued through Lincoln Park, where they have made good use of dead trees.

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As we approached the zoo we saw a very large group of people – playing Pokemon!

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Eventually we made it out of the Pokemon crowd to a more serene part of the park, near Fullerton Street.

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Chicago even has skyscraper bird houses.

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We spent the rest of the afternoon back downtown at Grant Park for the Taste of Chicago.

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They had cooking competitions. This one is a Puerto Rico – Chicago specialty – the Jibarito.

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We finished the day walking along the river.

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Often when I photograph Marina City I shoot up – totally forgetting that there is actually a marina in Marina City.

As always we had a great time in Chicago.

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Denver – 2012 Road Trip – Day 6 – Red Rocks 4th of July

Wednesday was July 4th, and we started our day by heading out the Boulder Turnpike to the city of Boulder. Just before entering town there is an overlook that has a panoramic view of the city with the Front Range behind it. Next to this rest area is a prairie dog field.

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We wandered around town for a while, getting the car washed while forgetting to close the gas cap (no problems, apparently just cleaner gas), then headed up Flagstaff Mountain. This mountain rising about 1800’ above Boulder, and affords a view all the way to Denver.

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Travelling south from Boulder on Colorado 93 we passed through open spaces with continuous views of the Rockies, which continued all the way to Golden.

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One in Golden we spent a few hours wandering the town and watching the people tubing in the river, and had lunch.

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After this we continued south to Dinosaur Ridge. Dinosaur Ridge is a segment of the Dakota Hogback in the Morrison Fossil Area National Natural Landmark located in Morrison. The Dinosaur Ridge area is one of the world’s most famous dinosaur fossil localities. In 1877, some of the best-known dinosaurs were found here, including Apatosaurus, Diplodocus, Stegosaurus and Allosaurus.

 

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With the high forest fire danger there were no fireworks anywhere in Colorado, but we had something even better, a concert at Red Rocks. I had pre-purchased tickets for a Blues Travelers show. They were celebrating their 25th anniversary, and apparently play Red Rocks every July 4th. This year they opened the show by playing their latest album Suzie Cracks the Whip in its entirety.  The band Fitz and the Tantrums opened.

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The Blues Travelers played a 25 song set, finished up with a cover of The Devil Went Down to Georgia. We took our time leaving, which was surprising easy, and after a late night snack, was done for the evening.

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Bethel, NY – June 2012 – Woodstock Music Festival Site

Another road trip to Boston allowed me a chance to stop by the site where the Woodstock Music Festival was held. The site is actually in Bethel, New York, as the town of Woodstock found out how large it would be and refused to permit it.

Currently there is a nicely landscaped amphitheater at the site, along with a museum.

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Denver – May 2010 – Red Rocks

Despite the fact we spent the morning snowboarding/skiing, when we returned to Denver it was 70 and sunny. Since we had time, I went to seek out somewhere I had always wanted to see, Red Rocks Amphitheater.

To our good luck, they were having a high school graduation (not the one we were there for) that day so it was open, giving us the chance to tour the entire facility.

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