Reunion with Chicago

Due to Coronavirus, many social events were cancelled – Ray’s 30^th medical school reunion in 2020 was one of those events. While the pandemic was not technically over and cases of the latest variant were on the rise, Northwestern scheduled a “multiyear” 30^th reunion in April 2022. So Ray and Traci decided to travel to Chicago, the couple’s first trip east since the pandemic started. Making things a little more interesting was the end of the Federal mask requirement on airplanes a week before their trip. It was refreshing to walk around the Seattle airport and fly for four hours without having to wear a mask.

Ray and Traci’s flight was an uneventful 4 hours although the plane had to wait 45 minutes on the tarmac behind 22 other planes before departing Seattle. At O’Hare, they took the airport tram to the rental car facility to pick up their rental car. At the rental counter, they found out Dollar didn’t have their car ready and, along with a handful of other customers, Ray and Traci waited 40 minutes before being assigned their car. As with their fellow car renters, Ray and Traci could not recall ever having to wait for a car to be prepared – some felt Dollar was short of cars and probably overbooked their rentals. In any case, their Nissan Versa was finally ready to enter the Thursday evening rush hour traffic of Chicago.

It took about 75 minutes to travel the 16 miles from O’Hare to downtown Chicago in mostly stop and go traffic – Google Maps navigated a route on many side streets before finally getting on I-90 into the loop. Ray and Traci arrived at the Water Tower Place in Chicago’s North Loop, at the heart of the “Miracle Mile.” Ray used spothero.com to reserve a parking spot at a next door garage which charged $20 a night rather than $75 at the Water Tower Place. The Ritz Carlton, located in the middle portion of the very tall Water Tower Place, had a reunion group rate so the couple decided to take advantage of it and booked a room at the hotel. After checking in at the 12^th floor lobby, Ray and Traci found that their new Chicago home on the 25^th floor was located right across the park from Northwestern’s Lurie Childrens Hospital and had a nice view of Navy Pier and the Chicago waterfront. 

Their room was quite spacious with a combination chaise lounge/couch, a nice sized dining table and chairs and a well-equipped bathroom complete with double sinks. Since the Northwestern rate was half of the typical room price found on the internet, the couple was quite impressed with the deal.

Ray figured since they would still be on west coast time, he booked a late dinner reservation at Gibson’s Steakhouse on Rush Street. Gibson’s is a well-known Chicago institution – despite arriving at 8:30pm, the place was packed with people waiting for tables and hanging out in the bar. The décor was very similar to Seattle’s Metropolitan Grill – and the lively atmosphere with very professional wait staff served some amazing food. After sharing a Caesar salad, Ray had their Australian Grass Fed Rib Eye steak and Traci had Chilean Sea Bass – both were excellent! They ordered a side of mashed potatoes and received 1 lb of the buttery treat which made Ray glad there would be a lot of cardiologists at the reunion. With no appetite left for dessert, they walked back to their hotel.

Friday morning brought the start of the reunion activities – Ray went to register and attend a presentation on Chicago’s Lurie Children’s Hospital – built in 2012, the prestigious facility is nationally ranked as a center of excellence for Pediatric Care. Unfortunately, an in person tour was not offered so attendees had to settle for a video presentation. Afterwards, Ray and Traci decided to have brunch at Wildberry Cafe, a popular breakfast/brunch spot next door to the Ritz Carlton. The restaurant is typically quite busy especially in the late morning, but they only had to wait 20 minutes for a table in the packed restaurant. While waiting, Ray and Traci noted some people lined up behind a rope barrier set up by the Ritz Carlton staff. They realized a sports team was staying at their hotel. Soon it became clear the Los Angeles Angels were leaving for their game against the White Sox – to Traci’s disappointment, they did not get to see MLB’s latest phenom – Shohei Ohtani, but they did see Ryan Tepara get on the team bus and Mike Trout get into his private SUV. Hopefully the small crowd of fans managed to get some autographs. Once seated, Ray ordered a ham, egg and cheddar cheese breakfast and Traci had French toast. Both were excellent, making the couple 2 for 2 in outstanding meals. Service at Wildberry Cafe was very fast and professional. After leaving Wildberry Cafe, the couple walked down the famous Michigan Avenue. Lately downtown Chicago has made the news for roving gangs of thieves that smash windows and doors to steal high end goods. Evidence of this was clear – jewelry stores along the “Miracle Mile” had signs stating their storefront displays had replicas of items like Rolex watches and if you peek into the store, the display cases were often empty. On the other hand, unlike Seattle, Ray and Traci did not encounter any tent dwellings and found the area to be very clean. After crossing the short bridge over the Chicago River, they entered the Art Institute of Chicago. The famed art museum has a large collection of a wide range of art including ancient Chinese and Egyptian artifacts to some “interesting” modern art. The displayed art is housed in a 3 story spacious complex – one could spend days looking at the different things but it is well organized and the map handout gives one a short list of exceptional items to see in a limited time. Ray didn’t know Claude Monet painted 250 works of water lilies – he saw individual paintings in places like the Met in New York, but in this museum they had 3 water lilies paintings side by side. Traci enjoyed seeing Van Gogh’s “The Bedroom” which she once sketched many years ago. From a more recent era, large stained glass windows titled “America Windows” by Marc Chagall were very impressive. 

From the Art Institute, Ray and Traci walked across the street to Millennium Park – a beautiful expansive area in the heart of the city and a definite Chicago highlight. At the Chicago River, they took the stairs down to the Chicago Riverwalk – a long pedestrian path along the South side of the river. Restaurants, shops, and especially the many boat tour companies are found along this very popular walking and running path that extends from the river outlet in Lake Michigan well into downtown. 

From the Riverwalk they went back to the Northwestern Chicago Campus and attended a dinner held at the school atrium. Fortunately the dinner was catered by Gibson’s so they got another chance to sample delicious food including salmon, beef and chicken. This night, the highlight was the desserts – Traci loved their carrot cake and Ray thought their chocolate mousse cake was excellent. After returning to their hotel room, Ray received a notification on his phone from Alaska Airlines that their flight home on Sunday was cancelled. The notification stated they would be rebooked on a different flight and to watch for an email with the details. Ray called Alaska Airlines and found out their automatic rebooking was for Tuesday, 48 hours after originally scheduled. Ray told them that was unacceptable, and the helpful Alaska reservation agent managed to get the couple on a United Airlines non-stop flight leaving 1 hour after their original Alaska flight. Alaska has been troubled with flight cancellations due to pilot shortages, and the lesson learned is to immediately call the airline for rebooking as you will likely get an automatic rebooking that you don’t want.

After feasting for two days, Ray decided to start Saturday morning by running along his favorite path during med school – north along Lake Michigan and into the Lincoln Park Zoo. The cool morning was made colder by a strong breeze bringing waves up along the concrete wall separating the city from the lake. The zoo was closed early in the morning so all Ray saw were some Canadian geese in a pond. On the way back, he stopped at Stan’s Donuts on Rush Street to pick up a morning donut treat. After the run, Ray and Traci attended a school luncheon, this time held at the Ritz Carlton. While they served the typical “rubber” chicken lunch, the Ritz’s rubber chicken was definitely better than most. They also had a nice selection of desserts including strawberry cheesecake, chocolate mousse, and purple (in honor of Northwestern) macarons. After the luncheon, Ray and Traci took their rental car up to Evanston, home of the Northwestern undergraduate campus. Ray had not been back “on campus” for over 30 years. He was amazed at all of the improvements – visitors center, performing arts theatre, new school buildings and especially the athletic facilities. Despite the new facilities and development which mostly occurred along the Lake Michigan waterfront, the grassy areas which gave the school its charm remained intact.  For whatever reason, the northern campus was attacked by clouds of gnats making Ray and Traci glad they had masks to wear. Ray asked some of the students why the bugs were taking over and they said it had something to do with the change to warmer weather. Ray and Traci visited the Grosse Pointe Lighthouse north of campus before returning to their car and driving back to Chicago.

During the 30 minute drive, dark clouds were visible in advance of expected thunderstorms. Ray and Traci decided to pick up food from Chicago’s celebrated pizza house, Gino’s East. An institution located next to the medical school, Ray remembered enjoying many great pizzas back in the day. Ray placed an online order and along with Traci, walked the three blocks to get their pie. Chicago deep dish pizza is legendary for having thick and tall crust surrounding heaping amounts of toppings, cheese and tomato sauce. Gino’s provided a crisp flaky thick crust, not oily. It was as good as Ray remembered it. Fortunately, the expected Chicago thunderstorm held off until Ray and Traci were back in their room to enjoy their pizza dinner. For 90 minutes, frequent lightning flashes illuminated the dark sky with thunder and rain also making an appearance. Nature put on quite a Saturday night show for the travelers.

On Sunday, Ray again traversed the waterfront and ran thru the zoo. The weather and lake were much calmer after the previous evening’s electrical storm. Back at the hotel, Ray and Traci packed up and made the hour long Sunday commute to O’Hare – even on a Sunday afternoon, the highways get quite congested in Chicago! After returning their car, they checked in on their new airline – United – and fortunately had an uneventful trip back to Seattle.