Tagged “travel”

For a while now I’ve been enjoying this series of bite-sized travel guides from The Guardian, which puts the spotlight on a European town or city and hands over to a switched-on local to share food, shopping, cultural and green space highlights.

I just made a first visit to Chicago. It was primarily to attend An Event Apart but I was lucky enough to have a little time to check out the city, too.

Firstly I want to thank all the friends who provided tips for things to do and see in The Windy City – Aleks, Susan, Jenny, Lucy, Alan and Karen, Collette etc – cheers!

Thanks also to Davie for jetting in from NYC to join me and Liam for a couple of days. I doff my cap to your knowledge of beautifully designed restaurants with really expensive menus 😉.

I also got the chance to catch up with old friend Nick Calingaert AKA Common Factor, a lovely guy and talented producer who DJed for me and my friends at a couple of our club nights back in the early 00s.

We only had a few days, but I felt we managed to cram in some good stuff. Here’s a summary of the highlights.

Eating out #

• Swift & Sons
• Momataro
• Chicago Athletic Club (with its appropriately posh tag-line “Dine and Libate”…)

Bars #

• Danny’s Bar
• Rainbo Bar

Record Shopping #

• Gramaphone Records
• Dusty Groove
• Shuga Records, 1272 N. Milwaukee Ave
• Reckless Records

Cool Neighbourhoods #

• Wicker Park area

Culture / History #

• Architecture Boat Tour
• The Art Institute of Chicago

Things to do #

• Millenium Park
• Cloud Gate (AKA The Bean)

And if we’d had more time… #

• Go see the Cubs playing baseball at Wrigley Field
• Green Mill Jazz Club