Beach and paddling in Lake Michigan

Weather forecasting remains an imprecise science.  I have lugged my coat and hat around all day on a hot day on the promise of rain in the early evening - rain which never came, and still isn't going to arrive for a few more hours.

Today, after doing the first full batch of laundry (which cost just $2 - $1 each for the washer and drier) I took the train further up the North side to some of the beaches.  It was sunny and hot, so I tried to keep in the shade of the trees as much as possible.  It's nice that there are so many sandy beaches so close to the centre of a big city like Chicago.  I walked about a bit, up to the next metro stop a few blocks further North and paddled in the lake for a bit.  I was there for a couple of hours until I knew I had to leave to get to the restaurant on time.##

I thought I'd left plenty of time (cue The Crystal Maze's Richard O'Brien: 'There's NOT plenty of time!') as I worked out I could change to the Brown or Purple line on the way back to get straight to the restaurant without going back to the hotel first.  As it was, I arrived at two minutes to five - so just in time for my dinner at the Kinzie Chophouse.  From there, I carried on around the loop to get the Red line down to Sox-35th for this evening's game - still carrying my coat and hat.