First, I'll start with the cast of characters. I forgot to focus on getting pictures of the family, so I have to go with what I happened to get, and this one of John and Misa, although isn't the greatest, is all I have. This was actually at a Vietnamese restaurant in Green Bay, where we got Pho and egg rolls.
Caroline.
Elliot.
Mei, the fashionista. ("How many pairs of those light-colored Levis do you have, or are those the same ones you wore yesterday?")
Wells.
Nox. ("Take my picture, take my picture.")
Now with Indy. This is also the three-year-old who stood up at the Vietnamese restaurant when the server first came over and said, "Me and my brother will have calamari." We don't know where that came from. I don't think calamari was even on the menu.
The front of their house.
The back of their house.
I guess you could call this the side of their house.
The patio under the deck.
Look! I get to drive the real John Deere.
This is looking from the front porch. A lot of farms are all around, and most grow feed corn. This one is already under contract to become homes.
The barn across the farm, looking from the driveway.
On this day, the farmer is harvesting the dried corn.
The harvest.
What's left of the corn stalks. The corn cobs were scattered everywhere before the harvester came through, and they had no kernels. I can only assume birds got them. I didn't see a lot of birds, but three big sand cranes seemed to be living or feeding in this field.
On Thursday we drove into Chicago, about two hours from Milwaukee. We first stopped for lunch at Giardano's.
This deep dish Chicago pizza was really, really good. For all the times I've been to Chicago, I think this is the first time I've eaten pizza. I know.
We then went on a boat tour on Lake Michigan and up the Chicago River.
This river used to run into the lake. But because it was carrying too much pollution from the city into the lake, engineers reversed it in 1900. The river now runs from the lake and empties into canals that eventually lead to the Gulf of Mexico.
Our boat stops in the locks, because the river is four feet lower than the lake. We have to wait here until we're raised to lake level. You can see the wall of water emptying into the lock where the gate is open.
The Chicago skyline.
And a little closer.
Nox, Chieko and me.
Back in the river, we pass under a bunch of bridges.
Chicago is a fascinating place for architecture, and the river part of the tour passes by many beautiful and interesting buildings. This is Trump Tower. This building is 98 stories high and was completed in 2009.
The Marina City Buildings (two round buildings sit side by side, and two more buildings are part of the complex) opened in 1964, and construction was completed in 1967.
I'm not sure what building this is, but I think the reflection is cool.
The Boeing offices. I remember when Boeing moved its headquarters from Seattle to the former Morton Salt Building in Chicago in 2001. This was a huge insult to Seattle, but I don't think the city has suffered much. Thank you, Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks and a host of other companies.
This tall skinny building in the center is now the Willis Tower, but everyone still calls it the Sears Tower. At 110 stories, it was the tallest building in the world for 25 years.
The West Wacker Building is curved and has greenish glass to fit with the river front.
I don't know what these buildings are, but I like how they fit together.
The Bean at Millennium Park.
The artist, Sir Anish Kapoor, who designed the structure hates that people call it "The Bean." The official name is Cloud Gate. Looks like a bean.
After the kids went to school on Friday morning, we headed into Milwaukee, where we first stopped at Sobelman's Pub and Grill for burgers.
The burgers were great. I got the Sobelman, which was about a half-pound burger with American, Swiss and cheddar cheese; bacon; fried onions; and diced jalapeños. I also put jalapeño ketchup on my fries.
The people next to us got the other thing this place is famous for: Bloody Marys. Notice the slider, shrimp and veggies on the skewers in the drinks.
Then we stopped at a park by Lake Michigan.
Nox built a rock bridge across the stream and then jumped over the stream.
On the way home, we stopped at Kopp's for custard. Of course, I couldn't resist the banana split custard.
On Friday night we went to the Arrowhead high school football game to watch the always-dominant Arrowhead kill whatever team they were playing. This school has a stadium that would make many small colleges jealous. And a football team the size of some high school classes. We actually came to watch Elliot play with 11 other junior high school marching bands in the half-time show. That's Elliot looking to his right in the upper center of the picture. He's waiting for halftime. We left after his halftime performance, when the game score was tied at 14.
When you watch the video below, look for Elliot here.
If you look quickly, you can see Elliot playing the baritone sax near the middle of the students.
On Saturday morning, Caroline ran X-country at one school, where John went to watch, while we came to this Lutheran high school to watch Elliot run.
Then we headed to Door County (yes, where the Netflix documentary "Making a Murderer" took place), a peninsula in Lake Michigan. John's family camped at Peninsula State Park, while Chieko and I drove back to Green Bay to the Hyatt Regency, because there wasn't a single room available on this weekend on this popular peninsula when we made our reservations a couple months ago.
On Saturday night we watched the sunset from the start park and then drove to The Old Post Office Restaurant in Ephraim. That is Ephraim across the bay.
But first, the sunset.
The Old Post Office Restaurant. Obviously, I took this picture the next day, when the sun was high, and behind clouds.
This restaurant specializes in what they call a "fish boil," which is a Norwegian-Swiss traditional dish.
The fish is "whitefish" caught in Lake Michigan daily by the same fisherman who's been supplying the restaurant for more than 40 years.
The worker builds a fire under a pot and boils up some potatoes, onions and fish, all cooked one at time with only salt as seasoning.
Here, you can watch the flames.
This is the fish boiling for seven minutes.
All the guests got to watch the onions and fish boil. Then we all filed into the restaurant and ate at the same time.
The server debones (mostly) the fish.
Dessert is cherry pie. Cherries and apples are hallmarks of the peninsula.
This is the breakfast area at the Hyatt.
A barn on the road from Green Bay to the tip of the peninsula. Everything in Wisconsin is so green. And no one has irrigation or lawn watering systems.
Looking across the bay from The Old Post Office.
This art studio is also in Ephraim.
Mei wanted to stop at a candy store here, but this town was having its Fall Festival, and there just was no good place to park.
Heading out toward the tip of the peninsula is this squiggly part of the road, just before the road ends at the ferry terminal for Washington Island.
Here's a little drive around the squiggly road.
We then drive to the other side of the peninsula to see the lighthouse on Cana Island.
It is possible to walk to the island, and Caroline did the last time they were here, but it's warmer and drier to take the tractor-pulled wagon.
The Cana Island Lighthouse.
In this lighthouse, guests can walk all 97 inside stairs to the light at the top.
This is the fresnel lens.
Inside the lens.
Then we drove down to Cave Point County Park.
In warmer weather, people jump from the ledges into the water.
On Monday morning, the kids catch their bus to their schools. Except Caroline, whom John takes to early morning seminary.
This is John's office in Foedtert Hospital and Medical College of Wisconsin, where he practices pathology and teaches. This microscope let's two people look at the specimen at the same time, and it feeds the image to a computer with a couple of monitors that you can't see behind Nox, where John does his diagnosis. After this, we ate brunch at Blue's Egg. It was so good I forgot to take any pictures.
Then Chieko and I headed to the Harley Davidson Museum.
One of the earliest motorcycles built by Harley and the Davidson brothers.
A World War II workhorse.
This is a pretty cool gas tank wall.
This 2008 Harley was modified to look like a WWII motorcycle for the movie "Captain America." They couldn't use an actual era motorcycle, because it needed to be capable of stunts only a modern bike could do.
This is a replica of the motorcycle Peter Fonda rode in "Easy Rider."
One of the three motorcycles used by Arnold Schwarzenegger in "Terminator 2."
The Harley Chieko rode in...hmmm...It really is a Harley Davidson.
She looks equally good on a Harley Street.
And if I had stuck with my early dreams of being a cop, this is the cop I would have been (plus a helmet).
