Our Chicago/Nauvoo/Mormon Trail Trip Is Finally Here!

[Vanguard]

I posted many moons ago of our plans to trek out to Chicago via Amtrak out of San Bernardino and to then return in a rental car through as many important Mormon Trail locations as possible. I can't believe it but we're heading out next Friday (in 8 days)! The Amtrak will leave on that following Sunday and arrive in Union Station on Tuesday. We'll spend ~3-4 days in Chicago (architectural Chicago River cruise, speedboat on the lake, tour of all Grant Park museums, attendance at the world premiere of Devil Wears Prada at the Nederlander Theatre, a visit to 'Tilt' at the Hancock Building, Wrigley Field, Lou Malnati's deep dish pizza, Chicago-style hot dogs or 'red hots', stroll along the Miracle Mile, and a visit to Navy Pier). We'll then head down to Indianapolis on the 13th for the Drum Corps International (DCI) World Finals, return to south Chicago on Sunday morning for services at New Beginnings Church (NBC) where the now-famed pastor, Corey Brooks, has been living on the roof of one of his establishments for 9 MONTHS in an effort raise something like 30-35 million dollars to build a community center in his impoverished community. He still has ~15 million to go. Donate to his cause! We'll then trek over to Nauvoo for ~2 days to hit the sites and then trek through Iowa, Nebraska, and Wyoming in an effort to hit as many important trail markers as possible. I am sooooo looking forward to this trip. It has been in the planning stages for ~2 years. My wife can't believe we're actually following through with it as I am much too often more 'talk than action'. ; )

So what do you guys think? Any additional suggestions? And do any of you live close by? I have no qualms about stopping and visiting any of my virtual acquaintances on this board. At any rate, I'll take plenty of pictures and will attempt to post some once we return. : )  

[rpn]

There is a Mark Twain site an hour south of Nauvoo that makes it easier understand his interest in Mormons.

 

And it's a shame to be so close to St. Louis (from which many members began their journey) and not see the arches.

You need to know that some Nauvoo sites require reservations and don't do drop ins, these days.   So go online and register for what requires that.

[Vanguard]

7 minutes ago, rpn said:

There is a Mark Twain site an hour south of Nauvoo that makes it easier understand his interest in Mormons.

 

And it's a shame to be so close to St. Louis (from which many members began their journey) and not see the arches.

You need to know that some Nauvoo sites require reservations and don't do drop ins, these days.   So go online and register for what requires that.

Many thanks. Someone else had mentioned a swing down to the Twain site. It's just simply too much this time around. And yes, I'll check out the need for registering.

[Amulek]

45 minutes ago, Vanguard said:

We'll then head down to Indianapolis on the 13th for the Drum Corps International (DCI) World Finals [...]

We went to go see the last stop in the Texas circuit earlier this week. Five of the six bands who performed were ranked in the top 12.

Carolina Crown had a really good show (and ended up taking the win that night). I think it will be even better in the finals where there will be much more crowd participation.

 

[Vanguard]

7 minutes ago, Amulek said:

We went to go see the last stop in the Texas circuit earlier this week. Five of the six bands who performed were ranked in the top 12.

Carolina Crown had a really good show (and ended up taking the win that night). I think it will be even better in the finals where there will be much more crowd participation.

 

Ha! I knew I'd find someone who knew what I was talking about! I'm very stoked to attend the 50th Anniversary Finals on Sat. Our seats are on the 45 ~15 rows up. My cousin and her husband went to see the McKinney show in Texas this week. The Crown took it though I am a die hard SCV fan and now my family - by force - is too. ; ) I have always said as long as a Cali corps take the finals I'm ok and it looks like BD is destined once again. ; )

ETA: The tickets were OUTRAGEOUS since I had to purchase the entire 3-night package in order to get good seats. I payed out ~$700 for the two of us! I then turned around and sold the prelims & semi-finals night on StubHub and made a profit! We lucked out. If I had waited until single night tickets we would have ended up BEYOND the goal line... ; (

[Tacenda]

Wow, will you teach my husband how to plan trips, I'm the one that's always responsible for it, maybe the only reason we go as much too. These plans sound wonderful! I've never tried the Amtrak train. Are you flying to California and then grabbing it? Because I thought they had one in Utah. 

I made my husband go with to Nauvoo, and it was a blast. So much to see and do, hopefully 2 days is enough. I love church historical sites, I'm weird because I'll go over and over again to places like the Brigham Young home in St. George etc. with whoever will go with me. 

One cool thing my husband and I stumbled across was a senior missionary with witching sticks to find graves at the cemetery, of members of the church that headstones were thrown in the ravine. We got to watch him in action. He was trying to mark some unknown graves or something. Here's an article about the place. https://latterdaysaintmag.com/article-1-14167/

If it's still the same, try and do a tour of the homes that the Community of Christ own too, besides the LDS ones. And hopefully they still have the dramatization of the King Follett Sermon in the trees. That was an eye opener. 

Have a lot of fun!! Post some pics too, hopefully.

[Vanguard]

16 hours ago, Tacenda said:

Wow, will you teach my husband how to plan trips, I'm the one that's always responsible for it, maybe the only reason we go as much too. These plans sound wonderful! I've never tried the Amtrak train. Are you flying to California and then grabbing it? Because I thought they had one in Utah. 

I made my husband go with to Nauvoo, and it was a blast. So much to see and do, hopefully 2 days is enough. I love church historical sites, I'm weird because I'll go over and over again to places like the Brigham Young home in St. George etc. with whoever will go with me. 

One cool thing my husband and I stumbled across was a senior missionary with witching sticks to find graves at the cemetery, of members of the church that headstones were thrown in the ravine. We got to watch him in action. He was trying to mark some unknown graves or something. Here's an article about the place. https://latterdaysaintmag.com/article-1-14167/

If it's still the same, try and do a tour of the homes that the Community of Christ own too, besides the LDS ones. And hopefully they still have the dramatization of the King Follett Sermon in the trees. That was an eye opener. 

Have a lot of fun!! Post some pics too, hopefully.

I love 'master planning' large coordinations. I have similar trips planned for New York, Miami/Bahamas/Key West, and Merida (on the Yucatan Penninsula in Mexico)! We'll see if we ever get around to taking these trips. ; ) And yes, I am aware we are not the only one with interesting sites to visit. We'll spend all day Monday trekking around the vicinity in Nauvoo to get as much in as we can. We'll be staying at a log cabin style motel about a mile out of town.

[Rain]

On 7/29/2022 at 8:24 AM, Vanguard said:

I love 'master planning' large coordinations. I have similar trips planned for New York, Miami/Bahamas/Key West, and Merida (on the Yucatan Penninsula in Mexico)! We'll see if we ever get around to taking these trips. ; ) And yes, I am aware we are not the only one with interesting sites to visit. We'll spend all day Monday trekking around the vicinity in Nauvoo to get as much in as we can. We'll be staying at a log cabin style motel about a mile out of town.

I love the planning too.  I especially love it going on trips with my husband.  He is happy to go anywhere and it is easy to find things he is interested in.  (I only have to google "science museum" and many things usually pop up.)

Not so fun with my children.  It is hard to get input from them and they often only want to see the things they want to see.  I don't know how this happened.  I've always taken to a variety of places locally and on trips to expand their horizons.