Sunday – Chicago Blues

We paid a visit to Wrigley Field this morning, built in 1914, it is the USA’s oldest National Baseball park.

It is the home to the Chicago Cubs, who haven’t won a championship since 1908.  We wandered around the perimeter of the grounds, admiring the neighbourhood townhouses that had built spectator seating on the roofs of their buildings.

After our little exploration trip north we jumped on the ‘El’ travelling into the city, sharing the journey with hundreds of Chicago Bears fans.  They all got off at our stop, as Soldier Field Stadium is right next to the Field Museum where we were going for the morning.

Founded in 1893 to display items from the World’s Columbian Exposition it is a fascinating museum with many cultural treasures.  Possibly it’s most famous inhabitant was ‘Sue’ a tyrannosaurus rex, the largest, most complete and best preserved T-Rex in the world.

We spent the morning looking around the rest of the exhibits and then caught the ‘El’ back to the stop near the hostel, walking the short distance to Lincoln Park Zoo.

Established in 1868 it is still one of the last zoos in the country to not charge admission.  We wandered around the grounds, seeing the large collection of animals they had on show.

We walked back to the hostel when the zoo closed at 5pm and had a couple of hours chilling out.

As it was our last night in Chicago, we saved the best for last…the trip would not be complete without a night out at the best Blues joint in town!

We took a walk to Kingston Mines, where Sunday night started with an open stage.  We settled in with a couple of beers, and their famous ‘wings’!

The host Linsey Alexander called out peoples names, who then took to the stage playing their instruments, in a jamming session.  It was great to watch, some artists were obviously better than others!

At 10pm he then took to the stage with his band, it was a great to watch and listen.

Once the set was finished everyone moved to the room next door, where the next band had set up and started performing.

When that set had finished at half past midnight we resisted the urge to move on to another blues club.  Instead we were sensible and headed back to the hostel, we did have an early flight to catch in the morning!