Crich and the National Tramway Museum

As 'something to do' mum suggested that we could head over to Crich for the day.  Now, I haven't been to Crich since I was very young.  It's a small town (more of a village, to be honest) but is home to the Tramway Museum, which rather predictably looks after a range of old trams.  We were definitely up for a day out, so we jumped in the car and headed over the hills.

Arriving at the museum, we found a car park with no spaces and a series of rather ominous black clouds hanging overhead.  In order to allow time for the car park to clear we opted to go to the nearby Sherwood Foresters memorial for a while.  However, within a minute of parking up the heavens opened and we were confined to the car for about a quarter of an hour while a series of pea-sized hailstones attacked the car.  Summer in England!

Venturing down from the memorial, we decied to take the opportunity ot grab a bite to eat at a nearby pub.  They stocked some local beers, which we tried out, and served good 'homely' pub grub.  We all knew we wanted a light snack as we had plans for an evening meal, but when my sausage, egg and chips from the 'light bites' part of the menu arrived it was clear that I wouldn't be eating much in the evening!

From the pub we headed up to the museum, which had emptied quite significantly since the hailstorm.  It's a large complex developed in an old quarry, and allows their extensive collection of old vehicles to do a mile-long run along properly laid track.  We went on a couple of trams, and really enjoyed looking around their workshops and sheds.

If it wasn't for Graham stumbling upon it we'd have easily missed the best-displayed area of the museum that was inside a massive exhibition hall hidden away without any signs saying what was inside!

Pennington Party

We've a lot to celebrate and this calls for a Pennington Party!

Scotty and I are in the UK so a party is a good excuse for seeing friends and family; the summer means it's Dad and Roy's birthdays; Fabia's birthday is coming up; only a few months ago it was Mum's "bus pass" birthday; just before that Roy and Katie were married; and of course everyone being well is always something to celebrate!

You may remember in May-time I was very pleased with a certain shopping trip and today was it's unveiling.
After getting over our jet lag Scotty and I get down to business. Because of the weight and size of the tent we opted to buy just the tent, and not any poles. So firstly we have to create poles! Dad has a great "skip find" of a banister, and we manage to fashion this into the 3m centre pole. We use a few other random poles to create the corner poles (which are to an Egyptian standard 158cm tall?!?) and also create a few pegs for the guy ropes by carving the spares from the poles into stakes and using a few garden forks!!! After a few tries we manage to get it upright and supporting itself!

It's wonderful that mum and dad are so pleased with the tent, and it finds itself at the centre of a party. Although 7th August should be a midsummer's day rain has been forecast. We have space indoors for everyone just in case but a lot of people try their luck in the tent. I warn people that there was no manufacturers guarantee that the tent would be water-tight (!) but it holds up pretty well. It does come a cropper when the weight of water on the roof of the tent means the roof is dipping in and finally water is running down the sides. Overall, though, it's done pretty well considering it's designed for Egyptian weather and not British.  It stays standing for the rest of the evening.

It's great to see everyone and we have a real laugh with friends and family and a good catch up. Birthday cake comes courtesy of the Kent Croxens and Dad is helped by Martha to blow out his candles.

Champagne is popped, tasty tarts are eaten and we all continue talking, laughing, eating and drinking long into the night - a great time.

Day 36-37 - Chicago and home!

We’ve only got two things planned for today; heading to the Chicago Museum and then getting our late afternoon flight, but we get up earlier than planned and decide to finish packing and then head to the museum early. We don’t grab breakfast as we’re still full from dinner last night.
The Chicago Museum is good and we go to exhibitions that cover the founding of the city as a hub between the East and West coasts and the various disasters that the city has faced; the Chicago fire showing how much the central part of the city has changed.

After we’ve gone through the main exhibitions in the museum there is a kids section and we have fun with their sensory area as I pretend to be a hot dog, we count up how many deep pan pizza slices equal a Chicago pizza slice in weight and smell the various smells of the city.  There's also an interactive digital exhibit where you choose pictures to represent your experience of Chicago.

We grab a coffee and cake in their café and still have an hour to spare before we should leave to catch our flight so decide to wander the parkland and district around the museum. We’d half been hoping to find another dive bar for a snack, but the road is too busy as it is the main route along a park. Inside the park though, we spy that there is a lake area and then a zoo. The zoo turns out to be free, so we pop in and hunt out a few of our favourite animals before getting back to the car and heading to the airport.

Once in the car we still have made good time and it’s an hour before we should be at the airport, and it’s only 30 minutes away by GoogleMaps so we decide to pop into a Guitar Centre store that’s on the way. The store is huge and Scotty browses the guitars there, pleased with his purchase that is in the boot of our car. We get back on the road and start our final drive which is first on some main roads to take us to the freeway. We must get stopped at every red light as it feels really slow going. When we finally do get onto the freeway it’s the middle of the afternoon but is packed. It’s a slow trundle and I read the signs incorrectly which means we miss the filter onto the express lanes to O’Hare as they are in the central reservation, rather than from the right. But the express isn’t going much faster and so we all continue to crawl along.

It’s past the time we’d planned to get to the airport and we’ve still not reached the turning so are getting rather panicked. We start talking about how we’ll try and move the cases quickly between the car and the shuttle and the likelihood of having to buy another ticket if we miss the flight. We’ve checked-in online already, but know that it is now cutting it really fine.

We finally reach the turn-off and from here the traffic suddenly clears so we have a good run to the car rental place. When we pull up there the shuttle bus is loading up, so we quickly hoik our stuff out of the boot, check with the man that he’s logged us in and jump on the bus. Phew! We’re not sure which terminal our flight is from, so at the first terminal stop I jump out and find a helpful looking guard and ask him if the United International flights leave from here or the “international” terminal (the last terminal on the shuttle route). It’s here so we grab our bags and set off inside. It’s looking good until we see the queue at the desks. It’s winding around the floor and we join it, but ask an assistant if we can just drop the bags off as we’ve already checked in online. No, this is the queue she says. Scott remembers that we decided to upgrade our seats on this flight as a treat to give more leg room and locker space for the guitar and it turns out this was a great move as we’re now ushered to a totally queue-less desk to check-in. Sorted.

Finally things start going right for us as the guy is really helpful with Scott’s guitar being taken as hand luggage. There’s a queue for security, but we’re not fussed any more as we’re all checked-in and they have our bags so no need to rush about.  After all that rushing though, the flight is delayed; first by 15 minutes and eventually by over and hour. Still, the later the flight maybe the more sleep we’ll get as it’s an overnighter.

About an hour into the flight Scott points out of the window into the darkness and says he can see lightning. I have a peak and think he’s got confused about the flashing light on the wing of the place (!) but then I see it! It’s great as we spend about an hour flying through and seeing all these amazing forks come out of the sky. Luckily we must be flying at altitude which means we aren’t affected too much by turbulence from the storm, so we have the perfect view.

That, and the leg room we have from upgrading, are probably the best things about the flight as we struggle to sleep later and find the cabin crew unfriendly. For both the drinks and meal trolley the cabin crew make sarcastic comments and go about with sour faces. It’s annoying that despite it being dark and us having had our meal service they don’t dim the lights in the cabin until over halfway through the flight. We’ve got our eye masks and ear plugs but even with the nice extra legroom we really can’t sleep. Scotty watches a few films whilst I lie there persistently trying not to open my eyes. We’re both knackered when we come in to land - Scotty more than me as he hasn’t even managed to rest on the flight. We’ll have to formulate a plan later for getting over the jet lag before the party at MVR tomorrow.

We manage to lug our bags onto the tube by balancing a packed holdall on top of one of the wheelie cases as with four bags, laptop and guitar hands are at a premium. We’re tired on the tube but again manage the transition up the lift at Cally Road and Jim is outside to meet us. We grab a little sleep later in the afternoon, but make sure we get up again so that we don’t get too out of sync and can sleep tonight. We go to bed on Thursday night and sleep for 13 hours!

Day 35 - Chicago

We can’t leave America without a final diner breakfast and this morning we go back towards last nights dive bar and head into Mary’s Cafe next door.

We order our fresh orange juice and filter coffee and slowly start plans for the day. When the food arrives again it is huge and we’re unsure how we’re going to eat this all and get around today. Cleverly Scotty goes for just sausage with his eggs and toast, but I go the full hog and have corned beef hash with hash browns, scrambled eggs and toast (I don’t get close to touching the toast!).

We try to walk it off by heading in the direction of the park again to look around the Loop and at the architecture there. The buildings are fabulous with great lines and grand shapes.

The humidity finally brings some rain, but this is heavier than yesterday and we decide we do actually need to take shelter. We find ourselves in Jamba Juice and have two great juices which are so yummy and remind us of the great juices we can look forward to back in Cairo.

As it is the end of our holiday and we want to relax more than do touristy things we’ve booked tickets to the afternoon showing of Toy Story 3D at a cinema near the hotel. Popcorn and drinks in hand we head in. Pixar have done it again and it’s a great film. They just manage to blend something for kids and something for adults so well, with themes that just ring so true. This episode is about Andy going to college and we are both there thinking about when we went to uni ourselves and also when we came out to Egypt. The 3D adds to the film, but in a way similar to Avatar where 3D is being used to give the film and scenes depth, rather than to jump out at you. We’re so glad to have caught the film as Pixar just produce such classics and it’s a great way to end our holiday on a high.

We return to the hotel before getting food, and buy some Goose Island ale from the shop across the road from the hotel as we've discovered the Inn of Chicago has roof terrace where you can bring your own.  Happily esconced 22 storeys up, we decide to record a video blog.

For dinner we decide to try an Italian place near the hotel which is actually next door to the diner and dive bar but has an enticing smell of garlic that is drawing us in. It looks quite classy and quite busy. It seems that everyone else must have the same feeling towards this glorious garlic smell as it is packed and we can’t get anyone’s attention to even find out about waiting for a table. It seems this isn’t the place for us, but we know somewhere that is, so we head back to the Rock Bottom Brewery, grab a booth at the back and order a few beers. It feels like there is a lot more atmosphere here than last night even though it was busy then too, so we enjoy our cold beers and spend our time people watching and catching glimpses of the baseball on the many TVs around the pub.

As our deserts were pretty mediocre last night and we’re hungry we opt for a starter to share and then our mains. We realise our error when the starter of nachos arrives and its about the size of two main courses already! They are delicious and we try to do them justice, but it’s not happening. Our waitress leaves them with us when our mains arrive and we are really struggling now. I’ve ordered a pizza (as we are in Chicago after all!) but can only manage half of it and Scotty is the same with his meal. They give us a box to take away half our meal and we leave talking about how it creates problems for everyone by serving such huge meals. The main courses are so large, that no one can finish them so everyone ends up taking it home and putting it in the fridge. All all they need to do is have smaller portions (smaller prices) and then people will eat these, be satisfied and not live on left overs!

Day 34 - Chicago

We’ve got two full days in Chicago now – our longest city break of the trip. Although we want to explore, we also want to take the opportunity to relax, enjoy ourselves and have some time together. It’s been an amazing trip, but definitely a tiring one and we also know that back in the UK things aren’t going to “stop” either as we’ll soon be busy seeing friends and family again.

Today we first head to the tourist information office which is in an old part of town in a building that was once a water tower. There is some pretty cool architecture in this area, and we also found we liked the look of the buildings and lights last night in The Loop – real big city stuff.
With more maps in hand and ideas of things to do, we head North from the Water Tower to the shore of Michigan Bay. On our way there we stumble on a Farmer’s Market of sorts and browse the lovely looking veg and expensive flowers. There’s a rain shower, but we can’t do much about it as neither of us have any wet weather gear and out on the lake shore we suddenly can’t see any cafés to duck into. So we brave it along and gawp at swimmers in wet suits who have taken to the water. We knew Michigan Lake was big, Great in fact, but it’s still mind boggling that we can’t see the other side.

We get to Navy Pier which is a tourist hub and our destination. We’re pleased that it’s no where near as tacky as Pier 37 was in San Francisco – not a candy floss seller in sight! There are the generic tourist shops with Chicago-themed gifts, but somehow this place feels a bit more genuine, rather than constructed.  We decide to give ourselves a treat and book into the next film showing at the Imax. I’ve never been to an Imax and although the film, Inception, isn’t specifically designed for the screen we reckon it will still be cool. We’ve not had breakfast so eat an early lunch at an Italian place in the complex and then watch the film.

We’d heard of “Inception” but not really much about the film. It starred Leonardo Di Caprio and for us this wasn’t a huge selling point, but we were willing to give it a go. It's actually a really great film and one that keeps us talking all day about the concepts, ideas and designs. We also spend the rest of the summer recommending it to people, so it's definitely a good choice to catch it here.  Afterwards, we continue to wander around Navy Pier through the stores and then along the pier itself, getting a great view of the lake and back over the city.

We decide to head back to the hotel for a bit of a rest before going out for dinner. The weather here is really taking it out of us. It doesn’t feel hotter than Egypt, but it’s definitely more humid. We both agree that it would be hard to work out in the Far East with this kind of humidity as we’re just sweating like anything and not wanting to walk far out in it at all! There is a free “tram” back to the hotel, so we join the queue of tourists and jump on. It’s basically a bus done up like a tram, but we’ve done the real trams in San Francisco already. We lose our bearings slightly on the journey back and end up getting off at a stop that is not actually the closest to our hotel! But by doing this route we pass a place that claims to be a brewery restaurant, so we decide to go back there to eat after changing in the hotel.

We get to the Rock Bottom Brewery and go in the main door only to find a restaurant with lots of wines and nice tables – this doesn’t look like a brew pub to us! We must look out of place as the hostess comes up to us and asks if we’d like a table in the restaurant or the pub. We answer quickly that we’re after the pub and she directs us through a side door. It seems that there’s another “main” door into the brew pub area and we feel much more at home.
Once again we go for the taster tray so that we can sample as much beer as possible. It’s packed and we have a hard time remembering which one is which, but all are tasty. They’ve won a lot of awards for their beers here and it’s great that the set up means that you can see through behind the bar to the huge fermentation vessels.

After dinner and desert we decide to head to another place we’d spotted on our tram journey. It’s a dive bar that looks totally crummy beside a building site, but is next to a traditional diner and only a block from the fancy Michigan Avenue. We go inside and the first section is a kebab house – having had dinner already we pass this and push hard on the far door. We get through and are then in this great little dive bar. It’s got various brewery and baseball memorabilia on the walls and free stools at the bar, so we grab two and order a beer. Somehow, in the centre of this vast city, this bar still has a very local feel to it. We chat with the landlady and she makes us feel at home. Also in the bar are a few Amtrak employees, as it seems our hotel a block away is the used by Amtrak to put up their staff, and another lady who is having her kebab and chips brought through on a tray from the front. A great beer, great bar and great way to end our first full day here.

Day 33 - Pontiac and Chicago

Steve is doing the early shift at work today and when he comes home for his lunch we’re up for breakfast. We saw our goodbyes to him and try to express how thankful we are for him putting us up and hosting this fun weekend. We’ve done it ourselves and although you’re confident that everyone will be “normal” being this generous with your time, home and family isn’t easy.  Our cases again fit easily into the boot of the car and we say goodbyes to the Deedees too. They have been a lot of fun to get to know better but are staying for an extra few days holiday here before their 6 hour drive to Michigan.

Today we’re heading for our final part of the holiday/tour which will be three nights in Chicago. We’re splitting the journey there in two with a stop in Joliet to find Guitar Centre as Scotty plans to treat himself to a Fender Strat.

After the turn off at Joliet we set out to find ourselves some lunch and decide we shouldn’t go for a chain or name, but should be going for the independent diners to keep with this “real America” feel. This is how we end up in Diamands (maybe the sign-maker struggled to spell diamonds?) where all the chairs are on wheels!? It is indeed independent and unique, so we’re happy.

We eventually find the Guitar Centre with no thanks to GoogleMaps which sends us 3 miles off track before we find the store practically opposite where we were eating lunch.  Scotty tries out a few different guitars and is really in his element and enjoying the wonderful sound and feel from each one that he plugs in. It’s a difficult decision for Scotty but he settles on an American-made Strat along with a new set of pedals. We need to have a hard case for the guitar not only because it nearly costs as much as his other guitars put together, but because as we’re taking it on a fair few flights we want it to travel safely. The assistant disappears into the back of the store and finally emerges with a case that isn’t on their inventory which he lets Scott have for free. A nice gesture we’d all agree, but even better it is an official Fender case. It definitely does the job and we leave pleased.


Our drive into Chicago is OK and we manage to find parking and the hotel using the maps printed at Steve’s (Googlemaps can do some things right!). In the hotel we chill for a bit and I find in a magazine that there is a concert in the park this evening so we decide to go along.

The set up in the park is amazing with a full stage, sound gear and lights but outdoor seating and then grass for picnics. It’s a nice evening and a lot of people have come out for this free event. The Portland Cello Project are interesting and entertaining, but not quite as interesting and entertaining as we’d hoped from the write up. Still, free music, so you can’t complain.

We wander around the Loop area in search of food somewhere that is more interesting than a generic Hard Rock Café and stumble on a “cool” street with some bars and restaurants. We head into the Rockit Bar which has a few Chicago beers on tap and good food. It’s a hit, but after a long weekend we're too tired to really check out any of the other bars so head back to the hotel for bed.

Day 32 - Novapalooza Day 2

No one is feeling 100% this morning and we get up late. But we can’t be up too late as our Sunday evening show is feeling the effects of the time difference and we broadcast from 11am till 1pm.

You can also listen to the podcast of the show right here on the blog using the player below:

We later visit the other sites of Pontiac, visiting Walmart and Dollartree with Steve.  For dinner tonight Cathy makes us a final true American meal; Sloppy Joes. We’ve heard of these, but never really known what they are. Cathy makes what is roughly a bolognaise sauce but with added ketchup which we then put on burger buns and try to eat without causing too much mess!

We all then grab a drink or two and head into the basement for the last show of Novapalooza 2010. During the show we give everyone their cushion covers which they love and we Chimpcast again into the night.