This is my new front yard...Oak Street Beach just north of Michigan Avenue here in Chicago. Having grown up here, I find it crazy that for the moment this is what I walk out to each morning. As much as I love Paris and that is beaucoup, the skyline and shoreline along Lake Michigan is an amazing sight. During the short summer months, this stretch of real estate is an oasis for joggers, walkers, bikers, runners and tourists just taking in all the magnificence. Speaking of magnificence, Michigan Avenue starts/ends? right where the bend in the beach is. As I was thinking about this post it dawned on me that one could compare the area to the 8th arrondissement in Paris and Michigan Ave would have to be a combination of rue Saint Honoré and the Champs Elysée--everything from Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Anne Fontaine is here along with the Gap, Banana Republic and Nike. Almost exactly like combining the two famous Parisian streets with a lake that feels more like an ocean right along side it. Hard to beat on a day as beautiful as today!
These are the Blue Angels precision flight team which have been flying over head for the last two days as the Chicago Air and Water Show takes place. Honestly, these guys have been screaming over our townhouse, flying precariously close to some of the taller buildings in the neighborhood. Today, I had a million boxes to unpack but, much like a kid that has to be in the middle of everything, I figured the unpacking would be here when I got back, so put on my running shoes and headed out the door to see what all the noise was about.
WOW! What a show. Spirals, loops, nosedives--they did it all, either solo or as a team. It is incomprehensible how a body can withstand going straight up while performing a corkscrew maneuver and not throw up. Then to fly with 4 other pilots in precision at whatever incredibly fast speeds they are going at and not meet harms way is amazing. Frankly, all of us walkers, joggers, etc. were in far more dangerous territory as we were pursuing our choice of fitness while looking up at the sky or walking north but looking south. There had to be some serious pile ups out there today.
A little P.S. on living where I do: the summer is fantastic. The winter......
not so much.
1 comment:
Welcome [back] to Chicago! I bike along the same path/trail, you do. I have lived here for exactly 50 years, having come up north from Cincinnati, OH to study at the Institute of Design at IIT. I am a photographer.
It is such a great experience when flying into Chicago to come from the south east and come up along the lake, swing out over the the lake, circle around and come back heading west and see that fantastic lake shore and the eight lanes of Lake Shore Drive hugging the lake with a wall of high rise buildings casting long shadows into the lake if the sun is setting. Nothing like it most anywhere else.
Same experience when driving in along the lake from the south side. Really impressive after driving for 6 hours over 300 miles of corn fields in Indiana!
Anyway, would be neat to come across you when I am biking.
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