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Chicago Trip 2009 Days 6 and 7 Words, Photos, and Video

By Melissa Markham on September 2, 2009 2:24 PM | Permalink

Well, it has taken awhile for me to write about the last two days of our trip, mainly because I have been busier than an ice cream man on a hot summer's day. But that's a different blog post...maybe;)

On our last day in Chicago, we (all four of us this time) grabbed a bus and headed to the Museum of Science and Industry. We had not been able to see this on our previous trip in Chicago and had heard it was definitely the place to visit. We were particularly interested in seeing the Harry Potter exhibit.

We left our room at about 9 and ate at Houlihan's for the breakfast buffet. Awesome omelets. By 10, we were on the bus. Unfortunately, our bus had a technical difficulty on the way there (some access panel on the side hadn't been locked down, so it was popped out and posed a hazard to driving. We had to wait about 30 minutes for a supervisor to come and lock the panel so we could continue on our way. At least it gave us a chance to chat with other passengers!

We decided to see Wild Oceans, the Omnimax presentation and got tickets for the Harry Potter exhibit. Now, let me tell you, we love Harry Potter, but we were not happy when we found out that the cost of the tickets just for that exhibit were between 15 and 18 dollars each! You already pay about 20.00 for entry to the museum, and then they have several other exhibits where you have to pay extra to see them (for instance, seeing inside of the U-505 or visiting the Smart House). But all complaining aside, we really enjoyed our visit and wished we could have stayed longer, but I developed a migraine headache in the afternoon and we had to go.

Some of our favorite sights:

We started off seeing a miniature circus that one man had spent 33 years building each part. Here is a photo of one of the exhibits, but it really doesn't do it justice. It was magnificent! And Katrina and Jack enjoyed posing as clowns as well.

We watched the Wild Oceans presentation, but honestly, didn't find it that interesting or 'wild'. Not a lot of action going on in it.

Then we had lunch before splitting up. Katrina and I wanted to see Colleen Moore's Fairy Castle. This resparked a long desire I have held to own a doll house. This one is simply amazing. I really encourage you to take time to check out the website. We liked the exhibit so much, Katrina and I bought the book about it from the museum bookstore.

While we admired the Fairy Castle, Daniel and Jack were oohing and ahhing over The Great Train Story. Katrina and I did run by there later and it was truly amazing, but we didn't have much time to really get the full enjoyment of it.

Then we finished up by visiting the Harry Potter exhibit. It was really neat seeing all of the props and we spent about an hour in there. I loved Hagrid's hut and seeing the costumes from the Yule Ball in particular. The kids enjoyed it too. Of course, it ended with a Harry Potter gift shop with exorbitantly priced items. It's a shame that it really was more about the merchandising instead of shedding insight into what goes on in the making of a movie.

Here is a compilation of the videos we took at the Museum of Science and Industry.

Sunday morning we got up and headed home. It takes a long time to get from here to there and it was after 11 pm before we pulled into our driveway. Once home, we caught a glimpse of who has been helping our cats to eat their food....