Hey Travelers,
Grab your coat and hold on tight, we’re heading to the Windy City of Chicago!
This past weekend we took a quick trip to CHI town. The drive from Ohio is only about 4 1/2 hours but if your traveling with the Stine’s via car it may be more like 5 or 6 hours… Chick Fila is always calling our name!
We highly recommend downloading the Waze app. This will notify you of any tolls, road closures or cops (this may or may not have saved us a time or two)! If you’re driving from Cincinnati to Chicago be prepared to have about twenty dollars in cash for the toll roads.
We left Cincinnati around 6 AM on Saturday morning and with the time change we arrived to Chicago around 11:30 AM. We were fortunate enough to stay with our cousin and his wife (thank you Matt and Jayme) located 15 minutes from downtown. Their apartment had a rooftop terrace with a view of the city.
Since we were in Chicago for only the weekend we didn’t want to get lost on the subway which is something very likely with us (yikes)! If you are driving around the city like us, download the following app: Best Parking.
After you’ve created your account it will ask you to share your location. Once this is completed the app will find you nearby parking at a cheaper price. We found a parking garage that was only $16 for 7 hours. You will pre-pay on the app and when you enter the garage you will need to scan the barcode on your cell phone.
After all of the driving we were ready for Brunch. Our cousin took us to Westtown Bakery which was a 5 min walk from their place.
* recommendation: breakfast sandwich with parmesan potatoes
Now it was time for the Christkindlmarket. This is only open from November 16th to December 24th. This was one of the biggest reasons we wanted to visit Chicago in the winter, it offers a variety of German food, desserts and handmade ornaments. We tired the hot spiced wine for only $8 which included a souvenir mug and $7 for refills! People come from all over the world for this market and to collect the mug each year.
We recommend visiting the market earlier in December because the weekend before it ends was very crowded.
The market is located downtown Chicago a few blocks from the iconic Bean, Christmas Tree and Skating Rink. We arrived to the Bean right before sunset. This made for great sunset pictures, and the area was not too crowded.
We highly recommend to make dinner reservations ahead of time. We made the mistake to think we could just grab something…Saturday night around 6 PM, the restaurants had about two hour wait time. We always wait till we’re hungry and need to eat instantly.
We walked to Pisanos Pizza, about a 10 minute walk from the Bean. Luckily they had a “hot and ready” pizza connected to the restaurant. The pizza was just alright since it had been sitting there for a little bit.
Later that night it was time for the Santa Baby Bar. YES a Christmas themed bar… from the drinks to decorations this will definitely put you in the Christmas Spirit. I can promise you this will be a unique experience. We have never seen anything like it before.
You can buy your tickets online or you can buy them at the door. If you decide to buy the tickets at the door please bring cash. The tickets are $20 for admission only or $25 and includes 1 drink.
This is a pop-up Christmas themed bar and it’s only open during December and January. As you walk in they have Christmas music playing and Rudolph on all the TVs!
* recommendation: spiked peppermint hot chocolate
They even had Santa and his elves… be sure to sit on his lap and tell him your Christmas wishes!
As you can imagine this was a popular spot in the city. We waited in line at the bar for about 30 minutes. You will not regret this decision because it was one of the coolest bars!
The next morning we headed over to the Willis Tower sky deck. The sky deck opens up at 10 AM and we arrived at 10:30 AM. We purchased our tickets at the sky deck and they were $24.
It’s a great decision to arrive when they open, there were no lines. We visited the sky deck a couple of years ago mid afternoon and we waited for over an hour.
If you are a group of three or less you will have 60 seconds in the box, and if you have four or more you will have 90 seconds in the box. You can always wait in line again if that was not long enough time for you! This is 103 floors up so don’t look down if you have a fear of heights but still do it, it’s time to conquer your fears!
Time to learn from our mistake of the trip, check the cost of parking at Willis Tower before you park, because you might end up paying $49 like we did. But hey it’s definitely cheaper than an Uber.
We headed back to our cousins apartment where he made us a fantastic brunch with Mimosas! They took us to a cute little vintage market that sold a little bit of everything, Randolph Street Market. It cost $10 per person to enter the market. We are all about saving money so we obviously checked Groupon and they had tickets for $11 for two people.
It wouldn’t be a Stine vacation without stopping for desserts. We stopped at The Snow Dragon Shavery before heading back to Ohio! This is about a 20 minute drive from their apartment but it was definitely worth the stop!
That’s all for today! Tune in next week for Denver, Colorado!
ADVENTURESTINE 