» indiana dunes national lakeshore
The beach at Indiana Dunes is a perfectly nice sand beach. Lake Michigan is perfectly nice here and the waves seem to break nicely over the sand bars. However, if you take the perfectly nice walk through the woods from the parking lot up to the top of the Mount Baldy dune, enjoying this nice wilderness that is being preserved as a National Lakeshore, then you may laugh or cry when you see that the view from the top is dominated by a power plant and it's 400 foot tall cooling tower. In the opposite direction, steel plants are also visible in the distance. Few other places demonstrate the dichotomy between industry and nature as effectively. In any case, I think we found where the Simpsons live.

The view east from Mount Baldy, certainly one of the most memorable views in the national park system.

The back side of Mount Baldy.

Ah, wilderness.

» chicago
We stayed downtown at Hotel Blake which was very nice. Our main purpose was to meet up with Colin and eat at the very fancy Charlie Trotter's which I will only describe as...different...and expensive.

You've seen these before.

This large shiny object attracts many eyes.

Downtown.

BP Bridge.

The Great Lawn, Millenium Park.

Man, the Sears Tower is huge.