Chicago

Yesterday, I finally got to take the car to the autobody shop, I got a quote for the damage to the back door (it's all going to need to be replaced; I noticed yesterday also that the bike rack did also break, but only a tiny bit). They said with going through insurance it will take about a week and a half. Since the insurance company is in Canada I have no idea how long it will actually take for this to go through. So now I'm going to wait until I get to MN and my brother said I should get a few quotes. We'll see what my options are when I'm in rural Minnesota! Then the AT OIL TEMP light has been staying on longer than usual when I startup the car so I wanted to get that checked out but neither of the local mechanic shops had time for me til Tuesday.

So, with car stuff out of the way for the day it was time for the inaugural bike ride on Minty Fresh! Borrowing the Frank Lloyd Wright architecture map from my cousin I headed North to the Frank Lloyd Wright district. I saw some neat buildings and stopped in the FLW home and studio to refill my water bottle (I'd already done that tour when I was here for a day a year ago).

Wright awesomeness, so lucky to be staying in Oak Park, surrounded by Wright buildings!

This one is not a Wright but I love love love this kind of shingle detailing! It's like the bottom of the ocean.

After my excursion bike ride, I came back to the house to chill for a bit then I met my childhood friend Marissa and her Husband at Wrigley Field for a Cubs game! Prior to this game I'd been to one baseball game (the Mets, high up over left field) and never really cared for baseball. Wrigley totally changed that! I'm not like a super fan or anything now but it was fun! I attribute a lot of my enjoyment to my company and the manual scoreboard that I thought (and still think!) is awesome! I think it also helped that in our seats we could see the whole field well and the field is smaller than Citifield, it felt more intimate.

Eric's finger, Marissa and me...It's not a ballgame til you have a beer in your hand!
Awesome old-school scoreboard

The cubs won, 0:1 which was sweet because apparently they hadn't won in like 11 games. I had just posted to facebook that I wish they'd hurry up and score so I could go home... 4 minutes later, they did! You're welcome :P The guy, Darwin Barney, who slid into home plate went to the same high school as me (and I think graduated in my brother's year) which was also kind of cool to have a little hometown pride while in Chicago! To get home I walked up one L stop to the north so I'd have a seat. Brilliant plan (kudos to Marissa) cause I got a seat where I could read my National Geographic book on the National Parks (the West is calling!).



Today I don't know what it was but I was super exhausted and had trouble getting up. When I finally did get up I took the car to the shop to look at the AT OIL TEMP light that's been turning on when I start the car then I took Minty Fresh on the L and went for a bike ride by the water in downtown Chicago. I'm so jealous of this city and the beaches and paths right in the center of the city. I biked and drew and took some pictures then headed back in order to avoid have to come back after rush hour. (No bikes allowed on the L between 7-9am and 4-6pm), which also allowed me to pick up my car from the mechanic.

The waterfront marina downtown and my sketch of the marina, the note in the sketch says "Clearly I haven't drawn anything in a while, I mean... it came out Purple!"

I'd dropped my car at Russo's, the neighborhood and he said it was $100 for the diagnostic but if it turned out I just needed the fluids changed he's waive the diagnostic fee. Well he coudlnt' find anything wrong with the car, he drove it around, poked around and even called his transmission buddies and still nothing wrong. So when I came back to get my car, he didn't charge me anything! For his awesome customer service and help (and understanding of my road-trip-car-paranoia) I picked up a gift card for the Hole in the Wall custard shop I will drop by tomorrow on my way to the L as a thank you for his awesome customer service. So far I have been quite happy with the customer service in Chicago!
Keep it up, Chicago!

This is a chocolate dipped custard cone... it melted all over my hand and was super delicious. I <3 custard! If you find yourself in Oak Park go to Hole in the Wall Custard & Cones on Oak Park Ave right by the Oak Park-Blue L stop!

My goal for tomorrow was to leave the house by 10:30, and now it looks like it's supposed to rain and Marty and I just got back from the biggest hardware store ever (with the worst signage ever) to get materials for me to remodel her little mudroom into more kitchen storage space. So stay tuned for another Handy-Kaydee project! Hopefully I'll get to hang out with Marissa and Eric once more before they fly out on Friday morning too, so busy!

I'm in the capital of Canada!

Hi from Ottawa!

After the longest border crossing into Canada I've ever experienced (no I am not looking for a job in Canada, yes I am unemployed, my car is full because I am on a road-trip and no, I am not looking for a job in Canada), Ashley and I made it to Montreal! I will admit it took me a little while to really like Montreal. I think I was going to be more impressed by it. The original plan was to camp outside Montreal but then thinking about the time and money it would take to get into Montreal and that we were only staying 2 nights, we decided to book a hostel.

We arrived Tuesday afternoon and checked into our hostel. I would come back to Montreal just to stay at Montreal Centrale, it was the most amazing hostel I've been to. It was like a hotel, the staff was super friendly and helpful, I met some awesome people, great location... just great! After getting settled and getting the car into the parking garage we decided to go find some dinner. Ashley did a little research on Chowhound and we settled on, of all things, Schwart's, a Jewish deli famous for smoked meat. So we trekked over to pickles and a shared smoked meat sandwich then walked over to Parc Mont-Royal. After hanging out in the sun for a bit we walked down hill, and down to Old Montreal and the waterfront. We had not anticipated being out this long so we were both wearing inappropriate footwear (read: flipflops) and returned to the hotel tired and ready for a drink and some conversation. While Ashley popped in the shower I went to the hostel bar and bought some beer (2/$6!) and went to the "backyard" and sat with the group of boys who were speaking English and had space at their table. That night reminded me how awesome it can be to stay at hosteals (something I haven't done since my travels in Europ 5 years ago). I was up chatting with fellows travelers, from all over the world, until 2am, it was awesome.

Smoked meat, I'm glad we split it cause that whole sandwich would have put me to sleep once we reached the park with its beautiful green grass that I failed to photograph.


We went into a grocery store to check out the chip aisle. The USA does not have a big selection of chips compared to Canada! Today we tried All Dressed, delicious. They have flavors like Hot Dog, Dill pickle, Buffalo Wing and Blue Cheese and even bacon... crazy. I want to try them all!

In the morning we slowly got ready and had some breakfast and chatted with our new roommate, Miguel, from NYC who had just arrived the night before. We were planning to use the bike taxi system, Bixi, and explore more of Montreal with the main goals to see Habitat 67 and Marche Jean-Talon; Miguel joined us and tagged along on our little foodie/architecture tour of Montreal. (I love French btw, and I just want to get an audio track that tells me how to pronounce things, I don't care about speaking it, I just want to be able to read things!) Then when we were heading out we were joined by Sarah, from Winnepeg. So our little group of 4 navigated the amazingly bikeable Montreal. It was awesome, the bike system is pretty sweet for commuting but a bit of a pain for tourists. I should have just ridden my own bike and had my buddies rent bikes (of course then you have to deal with locking it up, but at least you can lock your bike next to where you stop without having to look for parking- it's as bad as driving!)

A Bixi station- awesome... when there is a spot for your bike to park,
or else you can end up walking a lot to find a slot.

Habitat 67 was amazing. We didn't even go inside - we just wandered around the outside. It was warm and breezy on the peninsula where there seemed to be an abnormal number of moths hanging out in the shade. The building is an example of amazing prefabricated concrete architecture. I learned about it about 9 years ago as a freshman in architecture school and it was quite exciting to walk around it. I love architecture :)

Habitat in the distance, it sits on a pier just outside the city; getting there reminded me a little of my trek in Amsterdam to Silodam

Habitat 67 was so cool to walk around!

After we spent a half hour wandering around Habitat we rode back to old montreal and returned our bikes. Then we walked around and ended up in Chinatown where we tried Dragon's beard candy. I didn't think it was that sweet but apparently my tastebuds are messed up cause all 3 of my buddies thought it was super sweet!

Mmmm Dragon's beard - (I'm clearly enjoying it)
this was pre-made stuff; someday I'd like to see it made in person

From there we walked down to Old Montreal and ate at Les 3 Brasseurs, I had the amber beer, brewed on site and pretty good though I've had better. Then we took the amazingly quiet (rubber tires rather than the metal tires of NYC) metro up to the March Jean-Talon, an open air market with beautiful foot laid out in bags and displayed in baskets, ready to be purchased.

Fresh produce at the Jean Talon market

After spending a while wandering the market and drooling over fresh produce we got on the Bixi bikes again and headed back to the hotel. After we started drinking some rum and cokes we headed to La Banquise for my first taste of poutine. I can tell you I was hesitant about poutine- fries, cheese curds and gravy did not sound good to me. Boy was I wrong! It melts in your mouth, so deliciously! The 4 of us shared 3 kinds: Classique, Matty (with bacon, mushroom, onion and green pepper) and Taquise (with tomatoes, guacamole and sour cream). We ate it all!

Poutine is delicious!