| 
Millennium Park and More
.focus())
Crown Fountain
Day One
During the first day of my family's visit, our tour guide on the river cruise echoes what I've been thinking: If you're away from Chicago for a few years, it's a different city when you return. Never content to coast on its reputation, the Windy City continually renews and transforms itself.
As a native Chicagoan now living in Iowa, I like to revisit certain places when I come home. But I also love to make discoveries on each trip and experience the latest "can't miss" attraction or the newest, hottest restaurant.
Here, then, is a mix of old and new, familiar and fresh, that makes our long weekend in Chicago so memorable.
Even for those of us who've "been here, done that," there's just too much to see in Chicago to fit it all into a weekend. But we sure have fun trying.
Along Michigan Avenue
.focus())
Cloud Gate at Millennium Park
Since its unveiling in the summer of 2004, Millennium Park along the Loop's South Michigan Avenue has been a magnet for families and visitors. Start your visit at the Wrigley Square Millennium Monument peristyle near the park's northwestern corner at South Michigan Avenue and Randolph Street. With its columns of Indiana limestone on a base of French limestone, the curved colonnade calls to mind ancient Greece.
More modern attractions await. "It looks like a roller coaster," our 13-year-old daughter, Molly, observes, looking at the steel pipes arcing above the Jay Pritzker Pavilion designed by Frank Gehry. Speakers are suspended from the pipes, providing surround sound for the expanse of picnic-perfect lawn behind the 4,000 auditorium-style seats.
Head south to see the park's most popular attractions, a pair of sculptural marvels. The stainless steel centerpiece of the park has the official name of Cloud Gate, but everyone knows it as the "Bean." Designed by Britain's Anish Kapoor, the elliptical, 66-foot-long sculpture resembles a jelly bean and functions as a giant mirror, inviting visitors to see their contorted reflections with the Chicago skyline as a backdrop.
As Molly and I walk under the sculpture with my wife, Maria, and 17-year-old daughter, Kelly, we see multiples of ourselves reflected in the Bean's underbelly. This has quickly become one of Chicago's most photographed attractions.
"Cool!" exclaims Kelly, as we head toward the Crown Fountain, a video installation designed by Spain's Jaume Plensa. A pair of 50-foot, glass-brick walls -- each with water cascading from the top into a shallow reflecting pool -- project an ever-changing variety of Chicagoan faces one at a time. Bicyclists spray through the pool; kids splash in it. The fountain is art to interact with, not just see.
Attractions throughout the 24-1/2-acre park include the curved BP Bridge that leads toward Lake Michigan, blooming gardens, and the wide promenade filled with joggers and sightseers. Visitors relax on park benches to watch the human carnival. In winter, the McCormick Tribune ice rink draws skaters, while the adjacent Park Grill (open all year) combines fine casual dining with great views.
Before the turn of the 21st century, none of this existed. The area consisted of railroad tracks and empty lots. Now, if you haven't seen Millennium Park, you haven't seen Chicago.
It's a short walk south on Michigan Avenue from the city's newest attraction to one of its most venerable, The Art Institute of Chicago. Most of this museum's masterpieces are on the second floor, where Maria wants to show our daughters Grant Wood's American Gothic. I make my usual stop at Edward Hopper's Nighthawks, and we all marvel at Georges Seurat's masterpiece A Sunday on La Grande Jatte-1884. The closer you get to this neo-impressionist canvas, the more the figures seem to disintegrate into dots and dashes.
Although a collection that spans Monet and Picasso could keep me here all day, looking at paintings might prove a tougher sell for young children. Fortunately, the museum's first level has become a family destination.
