Travel Day -> Chicago, Illinois

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Navy Pier is a 3,300-foot long pier on the Chicago shoreline of Lake Michigan. It is located in the Streeterville neighborhood of the Near North Side community area. The pier was built in 1916 at a cost of $4.5 million.
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Chicago Millennium Park



First planned in 1997 as a way to create new parkland in Grant Park and transform unsightly railroad tracks and parking lots, Millennium Park has evolved into the most significant millennium project in the world. And the reviews are already in. "Millennium Park," says one prominent civic leader, "will be a worthy creation for all time. It will define Chicago to the entire world as America's greatest city."

Located in downtown Chicago on Michigan Avenue between Randolph and Monroe Streets, the 24.5-acre park is an unprecedented center for world-class art, music, architecture and landscape design, where you can experience everything from interactive public art and ice skating to al fresco dining and free classical music presentations by the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus. Among the park's prominent features is the dazzling Jay Pritzker Pavilion, the most sophisticated outdoor concert venue of its kind in the United States, designed by Frank Gehry, one of the world's greatest living architects.

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Willis Tower AKA the Sears Tower



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Chicago Botanical Garden

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CLICK HERE FOR 11 ASTONISHING FACTS ABOUT CHICAGO

CHICAGO FAST FACTS
Country: USA
State: Illinois
Established In: 1837(Incorporated as a city)
Population: 2,707,120
Area: 606.1 km2
Demonym: Chicagoan

Chicago is the third largest city in United States, apart from being its third largest metropolitan area.

Chicago is the largest city located on the Great Lakes, along with being the 22nd largest urban area in the world, by population.

Chicago has been classified as an Alpha World City for its economic and cultural influence throughout the world.

The name ‘Chicago’ is the French interpretation of the Miami-Illinois name ‘Shikaakwa’, which means ‘wild leek’.

Chicago was founded in 1772, when Jean-Baptiste Pointe du Sable, a man from Haiti, established a settlement on the north bank of the Chicago River, calling it Eschikagou.

The town of Chicago was integrated in the year 1833, with a minuscule population of 350.

Chicago is home to over 40 museums, more than 150 theaters and over 6,000 restaurants.

Chicago boasts of housing three of the world's tallest buildings, Sears Tower, Amoco Building and John Hancock. From the Sears Tower, also known as Willis Tower, four of the American states can be seen including Michigan, Indiana, Illinois & Wisconsin.

The world's largest public library, Harold Washington Library Center, with a collection of more than 2 million books, is in Chicago.

Chicago is home to the largest population of Poles in the world, outside of Warsaw.

Roller skates, steel frame skyscraper, elevated railway, cracker jacks, zipper, window envelope, hostess Twinkie, pinball game and spray paint were invented in Chicago.

More than 200 annual parades take place in the city of Chicago every year.

Chicago is home to the largest building in America (excluding Pentagon), The Merchandise Mart, with 90 acres of floor space.

Oceanarium, in Chicago, is the largest indoor marine mammal pavilion in the world.

Chicago is home to one of the last free zoos in the world, the Lincoln Park Zoo.

Chicago River is the only river in the world that flows backwards. However, the flow was reversed by the engineers in 1900.

Chicago is known as the ‘Candy Capital of the World’.

Chicago is the home to the world’s first mail-order business - Montgomery Ward.

The first American Nobel Prize for science was received by Albert Michelson, Head of the Physics Department of the University of Chicago.

The Chicago Cultural Center is the first free municipal cultural center in the US. It is also home to the largest Tiffany Dome in the world.

The Art Institute of Chicago is home to the largest collection of Impressionist paintings in the world, apart from the Louvre (Paris).

Alone in the metropolitan Chicago area there are more than 30 Fortune 500 companies.

The first planetarium in the entire Western Hemisphere known as the Adler Planetarium was opened in Chicago in 1930. The World’s biggest outdoor food-fest is held in Chicago, known as the ‘The Taste of Chicago’.