6/6/07 Chicago!!!!

Believe it or not, we ran this morning. And it was good. After moving the car, we ran about a half-mile to the Lake Michigan waterfront, which was remarkably beautiful and pedestrian-friendly. With the city in front of us to the north, we ran by the McCormick Convention Center, Soldier Field, and Shedd Aquarium. The area along the lake is public land that is very well maintained. The run was so nice that it took three miles into it before we realized that whatever distance we ran would have to be repeated on the return trip – woops! After scraping back to Matt’s apartment, we prepared ourselves for the city by exhausting and starving ourselves. Luckily, we had pizza in our sights and a train to take us there.

We put on our pizza-radar and set out for Gino’s East Pizza, home of famous Chicago deep dish pizza. Despite practically zero knowledge of the city, we honed in on the restaurant and found a booth there, where a lovely waitress named Patsy treated us to the Gino’s experience. Not swayed by Melman’s claim that the pizza here “sucked” (really Melman?), we waited patiently for 45 minutes as they prepared our meal. The pizza did not disappoint: a thick, pastry-like crust, and a pie that is filled with almost a pasta-like sauce containing tomatoes, sausage, peppers, mushrooms, and onions – all with a thick layer of mozzarella cheese on the bottom. Thinking about it right now makes me want to eat there again. Unfortunately, I’m eating honey-wheat pretzels for breakfast instead. Holy crap was that good pizza.

At 2:30 PM, we were exhausted and ridiculously full, so we then took a nap in a nearby Barnes and Noble. When we woke up, we had been completely robbed, including our wallets, cell phones, keys, and shoes. At this point, we asked a police officer for help, who responded with, “sometimes you learn things the hard way, son.”

Luckily, we consciously decided to avoid this fate and instead walked across the street to an 8-story Sports Authority store. We spent over an hour here and easily could have been there for longer. The spoils included hats for each of us, Under Armour shorts for Deyle, and a replica Randy Moss Raiders jersey for $15 – nice! At this juncture, we officially decided that Chicago rocked. For the rest of the day, we walked the streets of the city, beginning with a trip to the top of the John Hancock tower (96 floors). From there, we walked the “Magnificent Mile” along Michigan Avenue. Ashley, who is studying to become a nurse at the University of Illinois – Chicago, met up with was at this point. Between cups of coffee and a new traveling partner, our momentum picked up and we headed for Millennium Park. We saw awesome fountains, a modern outdoor amphitheater, and a ridiculously large reflective bean. At this point, we were able to meet up with Matt who had gotten off of work. The four of us left the bean and headed for happy hour on the north side of the city – this is an awesome day!

$5 Coors Light pitchers made the next phase of the trip veerrrrryyyy interesting. We enjoyed happy hour at a massive bar, Joe’s, which featured a large indoor bar, a huge outdoor seating area, and a huge “Bags” court (more on this later). To make things even better, Wednesday happened to be Doggy Happy Hour, where dogs could bring their owners to the bar and play with each other while receiving free treats. Needless to say, this provided endless entertainment as we saw several dogs take turns wrestling and mounting each other. Did I mention that there was free popcorn? Or that it was a pleasant 75 degrees outside? We could have stayed here forever, and we basically did.

Now, about this game of bags. The game features teams of two tossing bean bags at a giant wooden wedge with a hole in it, similar to those carnival games you see all the time. Each bean bag in the hole earns three points, while a bag that stays on the wedge earns one, with equal scoring from your opponent canceling out tosses. This place had four bags courts set up, so we figured we would just hop on one and give the game a shot. Ashley had left at this point, so we picked up a ringer named Heidi. Matt and I had never played the game before, and we slowly began to realize that every single person in the bar was absurdly good at this game. This included Heidi, whose patented wrist flick single-handedly won the game for me and her. When we prepared to play again, another player approached us and asked if we were “scheduled” on the court. Apparently, we had just finagled our way into a well-organized bags league and stole the court. These guys are legit and we all suddenly felt very inferior. Time to go back outside and watch dogs while drinking!

As you can imagine, things began to lead to another at this point. Matt started saying things like, “I’m at the point where if you ask if me if I want more beer, I won’t say no.” Pitchers began appearing magically courtesy of Matt’s classmate at IIT, John. Our only dinner consisted of wings flavored with a sauce called “Death Valley” – a decision we are still feeling the ramifications of. As 10 o’clock rolled around, Matt decided that it was time we see the Goose Island Brewpub, Chicago’s famous local brewpub. Goose Island proved to be a great call, as we enjoyed pretentious beer with names like “Rotweizen” and watched the Red Sox on NESN. Even the bartender got in on the act, ripping in to Matt when he uttered the phrase, “take 2, Papi.” Matt responded by borrowing a piece of glassware for each of us before leaving to catch the subway home. As far as we can tell, Chicago is an awesome city – a big thanks to Matt for showing us around. Minnesota has a tough act to follow.

-Jonah

6/5/07 Cleveland, OH to Chicago, IL

After sleeping surprisingly late and watching TV until almost noon, we finally mobilized and repacked the car in the Dietz’s driveway. While the fact that we needed to repack the car after a single three-hour drive was slightly questionable, we felt good about the revamped packing job and headed to Chipotle for lunch. It was here where we bid farewell to Muffin-top Dietz and the state of Ohio. Next stop: Chicago. On a side note: it was in Twinsburg where we ran into a little bit of a scare with the gas pump. We suspected that there was a leak in the Land Rover’s tank after the pump continued to run for 10 minutes. Just as we were thinking about finding the nearest dealer to investigate the malfunction, the pump did indeed stop, leaving with us with a price of $73456892 for the tank. Awesome.

The drive to Chicago was pretty uneventful. Once again, we thought there was a problem with the Land Rover when we did a simple gas mileage calculation and discovered that the vehicle was only getting 15.3 miles to the gallon. After double-checking his long division, Deyle confirmed the result, at which point we slapped ourselves in the face and renamed the car “Fat Ass”.

We arrived at the south side of Chicago just in time to meet up with Matt and go to the White Sox – Yankees game at U.S. Cellular field. Matt has just finished year one of a three-year Master of Architecture program at the Illinois Institute of Technology and is currently working at a landscape architecture firm in Chicago. We walked from Matt’s residence to the game, where we sat in the upper deck for $25, ate hot dogs, bought beer for minors, and watched the Yankees beat the home town team. Boo. U.S. Cellular is a nice, new ballpark with very steep upper decks and seating almost all round the outfield, making for a cozy feel to the park. Also, leaving the upper deck treated us with an amazing view of the Chicago skyline at night. From this point on, I had trouble containing my amazement with the architecture of the city, a fascination aided by Matt’s extensive knowledge of the buildings here. After the game, we decided to take it easy and prepare for our big day in the city. It was here where the decision was made to follow in Matt’s footsteps and go for a run at 8:00 AM the next day along the waterfront. What the hell were we thinking?

-Jonah

6/4/07 Buffalo, NY to Cleveland, OH

Waking up well rested, we spent the morning acquiring the last few essentials for the trip. A portable camping grill, granola bars, goldfish, fruit (to defend from scurvy) and three bags of trail mix completed our packing list. Finding ourselves to be slightly behind schedule we ate a fast lunch, poorly packed the Land Rover and headed on our way to Cleveland. The drive was filled with alternating sunny skies and brief showers. It wasn’t until we could see the city of Cleveland on the horizon that we were welcomed with torrential downpour. Fortunately, the rain stopped by the time we parked outside the famous Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Arriving at 3:30 pm and with the Hall of Fame closing at 5:30 pm we were forced to take in as much of the museum as quickly as possible. The highlights of the exhibits were those of Tom Petty, Jimi Hendrix, The Clash and the area of eccentric wardrobes worn in famous concerts. Throughout the exhibits of these artists and others were loose pages of original lyrics written for several famous and some not so well known songs. I thought these provided a stark sense of realness and humanness to many songs and artists that before seemed so untouchable. It was especially rewarding to be able to fully appreciate all of the history and famous names of Rock and Roll as we had learned in our Rock class at Cornell. Unfortunately, we felt slightly rushed through the last floors of the museum which housed exhibits for The Clash and The Doors. In order to adhere to the prompt closure time of 5:30 pm, the museum staff shut off all video and audio stimulation and released a small army of poorly trained security professionals to escort visitors out of the museum. They also implemented a freeze out strategy, by drastically lowering the temperature within the museum, an attempt to force out the last remaining visitors via sheer discomfort.

Next, we walked through downtown Cleveland to see Jacob’s Field and the Quicken Loans Arena (The “Q”). After finding no possible entry into the two venues we decided it was time for a beer. Jonah and I went to the Winking Lizard Tavern for a couple beers before meeting up with Dietz for dinner. The three of us went to Hard Rock Café for dinner. After dinner we headed to Twinsburg, OH (Dietz’s stomping ground) and visited a couple of the local bars before heading back to Dietz’s, where it was nice to find that a comfortable bed awaited each of us.

-Alex

6/3/07 Hewlett, NY to Buffalo, NY

The journey begins today for me as I drive from Hewlett, NY on Long Island to pick up the Land Rover in Pelham, NY. I spent the weekend at Marissa’s house on the island, spending a few hours yesterday at Lito Beach. The weather was warm and windy and I was pleased to spend some time relaxing on the right coast before driving to the left. In reality, the journey for me began two days before when I took the bus from Springfield, MA to Port Authority in New York. In a way, it was nice to get one last glimpse of the big city before embarking on a journey shall be centered on the country’s natural beauties. After seeing “The City”, the beach, and the mini-hub for twenty-somethings that is Rockville Center, I feel properly reacquainted with the East Coast. I’ll see you in a month!

The drive from Pelham to Buffalo was scenic, especially on Route 17 between Westchester and Binghamton. The highway rolled next to a creek in a lush valley for much of the trip, and some fog and light rain added to the aura of the drive. Indeed, I feel as though I have a nice standard for natural beauty coming from the east coast, in particular after spending the last five years in Ithaca, NY. As I cruised through central New York, I could not stop thinking about how awesome this trip was going to be, from start to finish. While it was mildly depressing to drive through Whitney Point on Route 81 (a route I have traveled countless times while returning to school), my discovery of the car’s XM radio made this leg of the journey manageable. I then drove the first of many legs on I-90 into East Amherst, where I was welcomed with a fantastic clambake and steak feast on behalf of the Deyles. The guard dog, Maddy, was not as happy that I had arrived, but I managed to retain all of my appendages and I think she even began to tolerate me after an hour or so. Now it is time to rest up for tomorrow, when we will REALLY begin the trip and drive to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.

-Jonah

The Beginning of the Blog

Hello friends and family,

We have started a blog to document our cross country trip this summer. We will add posts and pictures as frequently as we can, but for now please enjoy what we have so far and feel free to add your own comments. Whether you are one of the people we visited along the way or just a devoted follower of "Jonah and Deyle Cross Country Road Trip '07", we would love to hear what you have to say - enjoy!

See you on the road,
Alex and Jonah