After a short night in the not so Comfort Inn, the Hoppa took us over to Terminal 3 for a very quick and painless check in and security check, followed by the crushing disappointment of a lack of Burger King or McDonalds – we resorted to bacon rolls from “Eat”, which was actually pretty good. Boarded our Airbus 340-300 at 10am and a plane with 113 passengers (literally half full) took off promptly at 11. The flight was typically transatlantic – mind numbingly tedious. Greg took himself off to one of th copious rows of empty seats to try and sleep, Joe chuckled away at Alan Partridge, Wyn played Pokemon and Jen watched Star Trek. Food was pushed over to us at regular intervals – pretzels, steak & mushroom cobbler (which had no mushroom and was topped with what looked like a Jacobs cracker), a Gu Key Lime minipie, ice cream, cheese and pickle sandwiches, more tea… It still felt like the longest flight ever, not helped by watching us circle Lake Michigan for what seemed like hours, before coming in for a very bumpy landing.
Immigration was fantastically quick and it wasn’t long before we were off hunting the ‘L’ (via Chicago O’Hare monorail) – $5 and a 45min ride into Chicago, going through several areas that looked like little ghettos. A change to the Red line for one stop and a 4 block walk to the Essex Inn, which was modern, clean, comfortable with two queen beds per room. In an attempt to defy jetlag, we got changed and headed out for a walk. Chicago was very dull and misty – we were unable to even see the tops of a lot of skyscrapers. We headed up South Michigan Avenue, alongside Millennium Park, over the Chicago River and along to Navy Pier. We took a walk along the pier and admired the Chicago skyline all lit up. Headed into Bubba Gump for fantastic service, huge portions of fish and chips, shrimp and fried chicken, along with Halloween themed drinks in glasses that flashed with such frequency if you were epileptic you would have had a seizure! Strolled the 45mins back to the hotel, via a Walgreens for Wyn to rectify his second muppet moment (the first being forgetting his money!) and buy toiletries. Back to the hotel in time for bed by 10.15pm. Jetlag defeated!
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