Ethan visits Chicago

Flat Ethan came to visit me in Chicago, Illinois. Chicago is the 3rd largest city in the USA and is on one of the great lakes called Lake Michigan. Here he is next to the Sears Tower which is the tallest building in north America.

Our new president-elect Barack Obama lives in Chicago and after he was elected the mayor had all of these awesome banners placed on the downtown street lights. I was in the Grant Park the night that Obama was elected and saw Obama’s election speech.

Thanks Flat Ethan for helping James vote in Obama in California!

Here in Chicago I don’t have a car, instead I take the train everyday to work. The train in Chicago is called the “EL” train or the elevated train because it travels on an elevated train track above the traffic. Ethan got to see and hear the train all over the city.

Chicago is called the Windy city because the wind moves very quickly off Lake Michigan. Look, the wind almost blew Ethan away!

While Ethan and I were walking around Grant Park we found a CNN bus recording the news and sending it all over the world through this top-secret special satellite on top. We think the bus was there because Barack Obama is living in Chicago until he moves to the White House in January. Seems like Ethan could be a news reporter too!

Lastly, Ethan and I went to see one of Chicago’s newest sculptures called the Cloud Gate, but people who live in Chicago call it “The Bean”. It is so cold in Chicago so I to be dressed warmly. Thank you for coming to visit me Ethan and now I will send off to my friend very, very far away in Australia, where it is much warmer.

Ethan Votes in California

Flat Ethan’s first stop was out here in Berkeley California. He showed up in the mail a few days before our election day, November 4th.  So I took him down the road to the school where the voting in my area was taking place.  We actually got lost for a little bit walking on some winding roads in the hills but eventually found some other folks walking to go vote so we followed their lead.  I took some pics of him helping me vote. You can click on them to see them better.

 

 

So it was great to have Flat Ethan come help me vote for our 44th president.  It was a pretty historic election.  

While Ethan was here I went for a walk up to the park above my house up in the hills to get a few more pictures with him.  Here he is looking out of the San Francisco Bay.

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I was hoping to find some people doing some rock climbing but had no luck.  So we just hung out in the park near the rock climbing spot and snapped a few more pictures.

 

 

   

 

After that I put Ethan back in his envelope and sent him off to an old friend from Washington Depot named Holly who went to high school with me at Shepaug.  Now she lives in Chicago where our new President is from.  So off he is to Chicago.  I hope we get to hear about more of his travels here soon.

Here is a pic of me and my friend Holly the last time she visited me in California.