I made it! I survived. Nothing bad happened at all. It was even a little boring through some stretches of the south side of Chicago, and perhaps I was just lucky. This day, I only had 28 miles to make it from Munster, Indiana to Millennium Park in downtown Chicago. I had fresh legs and had slept in a real bed for the first time in 5 days.
Yesterday, the folks in La Porte at Temple News Agency (coffee shop) didn't steer me wrong to suggest that I cut through Valparaiso on my way over to Munster. There was a bike route from Munster straight north to Chicago basically. In Munster, there was a bike path right outside of the Hampton Inn where I stayed. Near the beginning was this fountain: classy.
I had researched where some of the volatile areas of Chicago were and I think this route avoided this; though, some of the areas looked a little like Lorain Avenue on the west side of Cleveland. Everything was really quiet at 10:00 on a Tuesday morning. I saw signs for bikes everywhere, which was reassuring when I was in the road. I cut over to the lake fairly early. There is a small lake called Wolf Lake just south of Chicago that was the beginning of the bike trail that would turn into Lakefront Trail.
It was industrial and reminiscent of Cleveland. Chicago and Cleveland are definitely sister cities. They are made of the same stuff.
I felt like I wanted to stop and take photographs the whole way to Chicago. The 28 miles felt a lot longer than it should have. I also wasn't able to turn off Google Maps navigation even though I had made it to Lakefront Trail. Maybe I'm a little dense, but I kept getting a little confused where the trail would split in certain places. I eventually spotted the hazy Chicago skyline from the trail, even though I had been in Chicago for the last 5 or so miles. Inside and outside of Chicago at the same time.
I kept riding and eventually I reached the Chicago that I knew. I found my way to Millennium Park and walked by, but knew I had to come back to it later. My cell was dying again and I decided to tuck my solar panel away since I anticipated a short ride, but it was energy consumptive. Shamefully, I ended up at Panera while I charged my phone even though Chicago pizza was located across the street. I had to locate a nearby bike shop to help me with my pedals so that I could load my bike into a box before boarding Amtrak that evening. Last year with my trip back to Cleveland from Washington, D.C., I learned the routine after doing a mad dash from their Union Station to a bike shop that luckily was as close as a pimple. Always bring your own pedal wrench (BOPW). I didn't want to bring my own heavy wrench, so it was just in my plan to have the pedals loosened before heading to the station. I ate my salad slowly before heading back to Millennium Park for my obligatory bean portrait that would serve as photographic evidence that I had a loaded bike in Chicago with me.
I flagged down a woman who looked interesting who was also visiting Cloud Gate by herself on bike. She had this fluorescent green (maybe this is where I would use the word chartreuse) crocheted flower necklace and she just popped from the background. We ended up talking and riding bikes around Chicago, and she told me about her life international in Europe and her work with endometriosis awareness in the states. She also, I think, is partially responsible for planting the Europe bike touring seed within me or at least adding sunshine to foster its growth. It just so happened that we had similar backgrounds in the English language arts, though developed in different ways. What a beautiful person.
We ended up back at Panera, which she wasn't familiar with exactly so it was new to her. You don't recognize restaurant chains when you're visiting another country. I was just happy to be in the vicinity of the bike shop and Union Station. Everything was within a mile radius. Dan at Bike and Roll and Randolph helped me out with my bike, and we talked a little bit about bike touring and I got directions from the folks there. It was fun riding with bike commuters on my way to Union Station. If anything, I think it was easier to bike during rush hour than drive--it was a lot of fun, and Cleveland had prepared me for riding on busy streets. I took the Amtrak from Chicago at about 7:00 pm and arrived back in Cleveland around 5:00 am. I should have arrived at 2:00, but we left late and had some delays. I put my bike in a bike box and it arrived the following day. They forgot to load it onto the trains leaving for Cleveland that night. I was very thankful to get it back.
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