Chicago Valentines Weekend

What are two young single girls in the travel industry supposed to do on Valentines Weekend? Why jet off to Chicago for the weekend, of course! Katie and I planned a weekend in Chicago long before we knew Wilmington would experience the worst winter in years. Our trip happened to fall the same week as our second ice storm of the season but we figured the ice would melt by Friday. Wrong. The ice caused every flight out of Wilmington to be canceled all week. After 2 canceled flights, we made a mad dash to the Raleigh airport to catch a nonstop flight Friday evening. We finally made it to Chicago and took a taxi from the airport to the Marriott on Michigan Avenue. We had beautiful city views from our room! 

We experienced Chicago style pizza at Gino's East and we learned it takes 1 hour to cook and Gino's makes their crust with cornmeal so we thought it tasted like cornbread. A little different and not our favorite. 

Saturday we woke up ready to shop! The Marriott was walking distance to all of Chicagos shopping! We bundled up and found a little corner restaurant called The West Egg for breakfast. They had great food and it was definitely a locals spot. I prepared myself for marathon shopping and Katie led the way! We went in every shop along Michigan Ave and I bought a heavy scarf and gloves because we knew Chicago would be cold, but we didn't realize it would be bone chilling cold. Finally, after 6 hours of shopping and smelling every perfume in the city I needed a break! A lot of people had recommended a hot dog place called Portillos so we braved the cold wind and walked 8 blocks until we smelled our way to the restaurant. It was worth the walk! We shopped the rest of the afternoon and stopped at the infamous Garrett's Popcorn for an appetizer before going to Tavern on Rush for dinner. We were getting ready to leave Tavern on Rush when we realized how crowded it had gotten in the bar area. I turned around to look at everyone and realized it was snowing outside! Katie and I grabbed our stuff, paid our bill, and ran outside! Real snow! We were like 2 little kids outside! Real fluffy powder snow does exist! When we got back to our hotel we walked to the Chicago River to watch the snow! It was beautifully 

The next morning we woke up to sunshine and blue skies so we bundled up again and played tourist by walking to Millenium Park to see Cloud Gate. We found the AAA on Michigan Ave on our walk to the park! 

The park was beautiful and not too crowded on a Sunday morning so we wandered around and watched people ice skate 

We went to the John Hancock Observatory and it was really impressive to see Navy Pier surrounded by ice since the harbor was frozen. 

We visited my favorite pizza place, Giordano's, for lunch and their pizza was 100xs better than Gino's East!  We ended our trip full and happy and already planning our return trip to Chicago!