Another return from Toronto

May 11, 2014May 3, 2015 / Greg / Leave a comment

It’s not quite an annual tradition, but my Dad and I try to make it up to Toronto as often as we can to take in some Blue Jays games and check out a few sights from around the city. Lately, we’ve been pretty solid good luck charms for the Jays, and it was no different on this trip with the home team winning two of the three games we saw. We also seem to inspire the best in Edwin Encarnacion on our visits. He might want to include some free tickets and a plush downtown condo for us in his next contract negotiations. Here he is circling the bases after one of three monster home runs he hit while we looked on:

A second trip to Toronto in 2014 for me, this was a really nice three days with my Dad. There was a lot of time at Rogers Centre for the games, a trip to the new aquarium at the base of the CN Tower, some time over on the Toronto Islands on a pleasant spring day, a visit to the St. Lawrence Market and more than a couple of ice cold Steam Whistle beers enjoyed while just generally hanging out. I’ll write more in the coming weeks on a few new to me experiences in Toronto.

Favourite 2014 travel photos. Chicago, IL. April 2014

Cloud Gate

May 6, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

Feeling like Ferris Bueller

April 30, 2014 / Greg / 6 Comments

I didn’t have a Ferrari at my disposal, and wouldn’t make it to the Art Institute until later in the trip, but spending a midweek afternoon at Wrigley Field had me feeling at least a little bit like Ferris on his famous day off. Ferris certainly had a much nicer day to take in a ballgame than I ended up with. But I was on vacation, the rain mostly held off, and in all honesty, it’s pretty hard to have a bad time taking in a game at the virtually 100 year old Wrigley Field.

Shortly after the gates opened on a very blustery and damp early April day, I took a seat to catch a bit of Pittsburgh’s batting practice:

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Early bird gets the craft beer

April 22, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

I’m blessed with a very robust body clock. When I travel, it can take me days to shake off even a small timezone adjustment. On this recent trip to Chicago, I found myself waking around 4:30am each day and patiently awaiting the time when I could venture out of the hotel to find breakfast. Even on my third morning, I was still operating on Atlantic Time. Why am I telling you this?… To justify a story of me wandering up to the Bucktown neighbourhood northwest of downtown Chicago on a Saturday morning in search of a craft beer bar called the Map Room.

There’s something about being on vacation that makes it relatively acceptable to partake in a drink before the crisp hour of noon. It’s even more justifiable if that drink at 11:30am “feels” like it’s been had at 1:30pm. By the third day of this solo trip, I was in an indulgent mood. The idea of a great beer (or two) in an outstanding neighbourhood bar while reading a book was what I wanted. After pouring over an outstanding draught list, I choose the most local beer available, a 3 Floyds Brewing “Live a Rich Life” double IPA (from Munster, Indiana). It was a hoppy, Belgian style double. At 9.5% ABV, I was glad to have a few of these delicious bread sticks to help mop up the alcohol:

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Back from the Second City

April 14, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

I’m back from four fun and relaxing days in Chicago. If you haven’t been, I can’t recommend it enough. A “second city” only in name, I can truly say that I prefer Chicago over the Big Apple for the quintessential American big city experience. Chicago has everything New York has. You get all of the shopping, entertainment, food, sports, art and history that New York has to offer, but wrapped in a more beautiful and friendly mid-western package.

What did these past four days in Chicago look like? I got to a Cubs game and a White Sox game and have to admit that I preferred the atmosphere on the south side to that at Wrigley. I spent a morning touring public art installations inside the loop downtown followed by an afternoon at the Art Institute. I wandered through interesting neighbourhoods to the west and north of the city. I ate incredibly upscale food the first couple of days, then ate downmarket for the last two days and honestly don’t know which I enjoyed more. I tried some great craft beers, hung out in a late night blues club and then shook off the ringing in my ears the next morning by walking along Lake Michigan and taking a place on the seawall to just stare at the Chicago skyline in the distance.

All in all, it was a great trip and a revitalizing short vacation. More to come on Chicago and my experiences in the weeks ahead….

A William Penn’s eye view

April 3, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

On each successive trip to Philadelphia it gets a little bit harder to find a “new to me” attraction to visit. That’s probably a good thing. Trips back to Philly are now more about neighbourhoods, restaurants, and events. But on my last trip, I did a tourist thing that was right under my nose for all my previous Philadelphia visits. Unknown to me until last year, you can buy a ticket to take an elevator to the top of Philadelphia City Hall to get an incredible panoramic view from the base of the William Penn statue that overlooks the center city area.

For a city the size of Philly, it’s a bit odd that none of the skyscrapers have a publicly accessible observation deck. But from the top of City Hall, about 500 feet above street level, you get some pretty nice views. First, here’s the view straight down the Benjamin Franklin Parkway:

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Behind the scenes at Wrigley

March 26, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

As I get ready for my upcoming trip to Chicago in a couple of weeks, one of the things I’m really looking forward to is (weather permitting) getting to my second Cubs game at Wrigley field. Four years ago, my wife and I snagged upper deck seats for a late season afternoon game against the Cardinals and had a great time. We also carved out some time to do a tour of Wrigley Field to see it in a quieter setting and to get a bit of a behind the scenes peek.

The morning tour started in the famed bleachers, and from here, you can fairly easily feel the history of the place:

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Tailgating with the Bears

March 17, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

I’ve been to a few NFL games now, and as much as I enjoy the simple act of watching the sport live, it’s also quite an American cultural experience. Nowhere is that cultural experience on display more than in pregame tailgating.

Four years ago, my wife and I traveled to Chicago to see an early season Bears-Packers match up. With a wee bit of research, we found a tailgating group who welcomed us to hang out before kickoff. If you’re not familiar with tailgating, it’s basically a group of people who meet up in the parking lot prior to a football game, usually to grill some food, have a few drinks and talk some football before heading into the stadium. In Chicago, it looked like this:

This tailgating lot for Bears games is located about a 20 minute walk south of the stadium and, as you can see, it is cars and grills and plumes of delicious barbeque smoke as far as the eye can see. Through this maze, we found our specific spot nestled over to the side of the parking lot:

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Looking back on, and ahead to…. Chicago!

March 11, 2014 / Greg / Leave a comment

It’s been close to four years since I visited Chicago for the first time. That trip came to be to take in a Monday night Chicago Bears game against their arch rival Green Bay Packers. Around that was wrapped some incredible dining including a dinner at Topolobampo that remains the best meal I’ve ever had, an architectural river cruise and a food and wine festival where I got to meet a couple of celebrity chefs including…

Chicago really surprised me back then. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I was taken with the city. It left enough of an impression on me that I’m making a return trip there in early April for a few days of vacation. A flight on points, the Cubs and White Sox both in town for early season games, and a host of food that I missed out on trying that first trip motivated this return visit. Over the coming weeks I’ll write a bit about some great memories from my first trip to Chicago as I get ready to travel to the Windy City once again.