The Pictured Rocks Thru-Hike

The Pictured Rocks Thru-Hike

I was due for a return trip to the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore to take a thru-hike of its 40 miles of pristine coastline. I hiked and kayaked the Chapel Basin section of it last year and knew I needed to come back, having barely seen a quarter of the shore. I got a backcountry permit in mid-September, hoping for a likelihood of clear weather on the edge of the shoulder season.

I arrived on the west end near Munising and parked at the Sand Point trailhead with a five day itinerary. It was the late afternoon after a six hour drive from Chicago. I began hiking three miles to my first campsite as the evening sun beamed through the trees. The forecast predicted some ugly weather in the coming days, but right now the day was calm. I reached the Cliffs campsite, set up my tent, and went back to the shore to watch the sun descend over Grand Island.

I woke up the next morning to the pelting of rainfall. The downpours had already started, and didn’t let up for three more hours. Which wasn’t the best timing, since the only available campsite I could find was fifteen miles away. As the sky finally lightened, I packed up and continued on the trail. Gradually it went along the beaches and steadily rising cliffside. Off in the distance, the high bluffs of the Chapel Basin gradually approached.

Crossing Mosquito Creek at midday and continuing along the Chapel Loop, I hiked the uneven terrain, already exhausted. Still, it was worth it to see all of these cliff points and overlooks again. Sunlight was spotty across the lake and isolated showers rumbled across the water some ten miles off. It was okay now, but was the kind of weather that could change in a flash. Passing Grand Portal Point, a rainstorm hit all at once, sending me and the day hikers rushing away from the exposed overlooks. Sheets of mid-afternoon rain blew in gusts, obscuring far off cliffs as the waves crashed and roared below. I paced along the winding cliffside trail, feeling wiped out and delirious. I needed to eat.

Stopping at Chapel Rock, a prominent site on the far end of the basin, I felt better after getting food and a much needed break. The rock and the cliffs beyond stood backlit in the clearing weather.

I really wanted to set up camp and stop. But since the sites around the Chapel Basin were in high demand, the only available site I could find was four miles further. Which would have been fine if my legs weren’t already sore and bordering on pain. Well, I can keep bitching about it on a downed tree, or I can get to my campsite before dark.

The sun was out again, beaming in golden tones through the forest in the late day. It was that time near the end of the warm season that’s not quite the summer or autumn, but it’s some of both. There were warm days, and yet, leaves started to wilt and turn yellow on the edges of their trees. Fiery maple leaves lay scattered about the trail. And though the sun was out, it felt dim, as if it was telling us that the bright season on this rocky coast was nearing its end.

With about three miles to go, my calf muscles were getting tighter than I was comfortable with. I stopped and looked at my right calf. Shit, it’s getting swollen! I needed to find my campsite and figure out what to fucking do. The Google Maps marker said it was a quarter mile back. What? Where the fuck is the campsite??? Did I miss it? Should I turn around and look for it again? With an hour of sunlight left and potentially fucked up calf muscles, I didn’t have the leisure of wasting any time. I charged on, exhausted and bordering on panic.

There was a connector trail about a mile ahead, and I at least needed to rule out that it wasn’t somewhere before that. So in a panic, I kept going. It turned out to be the right decision. Just a few hundred feet from where I lost my mind was a sign reading “Coves – Individual Campsites”. I hobbled along the side trail, found my site, and set up my tent.

Not sure what to do about a swollen, overworked calf, I asked some other hikers for advice – notably to read whether or not any of them seemed alarmed. None of them did. They said to take Ibuprofen and apply the RICE method. While there was no ice to be found, rest, compression, and elevation could be done. For good karma, a kilted fellow gave me an ace wrap to reduce the swelling.

This day was equal parts beautiful and ugly, but it was finally over.

I crawled out of the tent the next morning after more rain, and was immediately shackled by my calf muscles tightening overnight. I expected it, but I was still surprised at how tight they were. My body was mad at me over yesterday. But was I well enough to press on? I was about to find out.

My trekking poles, I learned, could be used on my leg muscles like a foam roller. Which was absolute hell. With that and stretching, they loosened up enough for me to walk slowly. The good thing was that the next campsite was only 7.5 miles on a mostly flat trail along Twelvemile Beach. So as long as I took my time and took frequent breaks, I would probably be okay. I said happy trails to the kilted fellow and his friends and continued east.

Moving on slowly, I found a pace that didn’t seem to aggravate my calves any further. It allowed me to focus on other matters, like the wonderful fucking weather. I guessed that a low pressure system was passing on and in its place was a full day of brutal lake effect winds. I welcomed any chance to hike in the trees away from the brunt end of the shoreline wind. For much of the day, I was exposed to 30mph gusts of wind blowing off of the shore. Waves farther off were easily breaking at 8 to 10 feet – the kind of conditions that will prompt a gale alert by the local weather service. I learned later that Lake Superior can get much worse. I wasn’t surprised that this area has its share of shipwrecks, earning it the maritime nickname “Graveyard Coast”.

At one point the trail went out of the woods, exposing me again to the wind as I passed by a cute thru-hiker going the other way. Over the loud gusts of wind, I yelled “Nice day for a hike!” She yelled back, “Oh yeah, it’s beautiful!” I wasn’t sure if her comment was from the same place of exhausted sarcasm, or if she really was able to see beauty in the chaos.

I got to Sevenmile and set up camp, well protected from the wind. And my calves? Well, they weren’t better, but at least they didn’t get worse. That will have to do.

Then I woke up at 2am. The air felt dry. I looked out from my tent. Treetops were still, and the stars returned far above the forest canopy. I got back on my pad and slept soundly to the rush of Sevenmile Creek.

Right before heading out, I shared the firepit with Ashley, who was trying to light a bundle of damp kindling. She told me she was walking along like an old granny yesterday with her sore, blistered feet. Luckily, I figured out how to avoid blisters ever since the Camino, but soreness was another beast of its own. I think we all go through these challenges in backpacking as we sort it out, one problem at a time. Either from new gear, conditioning, and/or learning to ignore what isn’t perfect, we find out what works for us in the bigger picture. As long as we’re willing to put in the miles. Today, I was in the granny club with her, walking half my normal speed.

I got back on the trail, happy to have a calm sunny morning. The wind was backing off and the waves were smaller, glowing in the sunlight as it was breaking over the trees. Over the day, I passed bigger drive-in campsites as I approached Au Sable Point. At the top, the Au Sable Light Station looked over the water. It was built almost 150 years ago to alert ships of its presence at Au Sable Point, a notorious cliff point and sandstone reef. Without the light signal, ships would easily hit the shallow rocks extending into the water.

The trail continued in the trees with a bit of gain approaching Log Slide Overlook. My calves were improving, with greater range of motion and less pain. Finally, they were breaking in and starting to listen to me. Which would have been good, except now my feet were getting the same problem. The muscles around my heels especially were acting up. The good news was that the thru-hike was almost over, so it didn’t really matter.

I reached the Grand Sable Dunes, which follow the coast for five miles before reaching the town of Grand Marias. At one time, logging companies used the dunes to roll their timbers down to the water and float them over to the town. Now, this area is protected land and the trees aren’t going anywhere.

A short hike brought me to the Masse Homestead, a secluded campsite on the backside of the dunes. I needed to catch a shuttle on time at the end trailhead the next day, so I slept under the stars to save packup time. It wasn’t comfortable, but it got me out sooner. I packed up at 5am and hiked the first hour with a flashlight. The trail crossed the road, where I turned for a straighter walk to the visitor center. It was time to take the shuttle back to town and look for pizza.

I reached the end with 90 minutes to spare as I waited for the shuttle. While I waited, I boiled water and made coffee. Just to relax. I recalled the last few days of my hike with the ranger, who was setting up a display area in front of the main building. She pointed me to an apple tree across the road. And so, my trip ended with me eating victory apples in the visitor center parking lot.


The Packraft Handbook by Luc Mehl

The Packraft Handbook by Luc Mehl

Over the last few years, the sport of packrafting has grown from a small community mostly consisting of backpackers in Alaska and Tasmania to people from all over the world – potentially anywhere that you can find runnable rivers that are accessible by foot. In more recent seasons, my feed has exploded with river footage from all across the US, Central America, Russia, Austria, New Zealand, Lapland, Scotland, Japan, and on and on. Which in one sense is great to see so many new people discovering what packrafting has to offer. But as the community continues to grow, so does the likelihood of mistakes, injuries, and fatalities. To date, there are twelve fatal accidents recorded that relate to packrafting.

In response to this increasingly important issue, Alaskan boater Luc Mehl published the Packraft Handbook in June of 2021, which is a comprehensive guide to amphibious river running. With the help of illustrator Sarah Glaser, this book provides a very detailed yet simple guide to everything a boater needs to learn – from preparation, to paddling technique, to capsize recovery, and swiftwater rescue. Which I feel is long due in this community. Because while packrafts are generally very stable and forgiving as watercraft, they have given many boaters – myself included – a false sense of security to run bigger rivers where we had no business going without proper training.

It was Luc’s goal to change that trend with this book. By adapting many of the river rescue techniques already developed in the kayaking community to that of packrafts, the book encourages a #cultureofsafety as its core ethos – a community where we can continuously educate ourselves and others on the importance of river safety.

The book is divided into four parts, the first being Foundations. Here, Luc describes the types of packrafts available, equipment, boat control techniques, wet entry, and risk assessment. New packrafters especially will benefit from the knowledge it offers on how to get started.

The second section, Rivers and Open Water, explains the basics of navigating different types of rivers and open water crossings. There are different types of paddling environments with risks inherent to each. Technical swiftwater is different from a windy fjord crossing, but both can be dangerous. It is important to be experienced and prepared.

In the third section, When Things Go Wrong, Luc describes many different types of accidents and the proper rescue response to each, detailing things like self-rescue, throw ropes, entrapment, rolling a packraft, equipment repair, and various examples of First Response emergency treatment that hopefully won’t be needed. I think this section is truly the meat of what we need to understand out there.

And finally, Part 4: Putting the “Pack” in Packrafting has two chapters about planning and logistics. Because it is easy to overpack when you already have to carry ten pounds of river gear. But at the same time, you don’t want to cut too many corners and underpack supplies that you might need, like say, a first aid kit.

It makes me wish I had thought about this four years ago when I made the mistake of running a scary glacial river in Iceland. It was a mile-long river connecting two lakes close to the Jökulsárlón Lagoon in the south coast, and appeared friendly on the satellite. I crossed the first lake and started down the mouth of the river, which was swift but calm. Before I realized it, the current started picking up into a Class II section and I was flying down a center line. Suddenly, I was seconds away from dropping over a river-wide pourover ledge of four feet. And a big hydraulic. With no time to find the line, I charged at it unsuccessfully and got tossed out.

And then I froze. Not literally, but mentally. For about two minutes. Flying down a river.

I thought I could kick my way to an eddy, but the current was too strong. Another rapid was approaching. I snapped out of the fog, threw the paddle across my boat, and lunged forward. I climbed back in and regained control, navigating the breaking waves. Ten seconds after I recovered, I went flying past what might have been a pinning rock.

I had originally planned to run another Class II-III river the next day, but realized as I got to shore that I needed proper rescue training and other partners before attempting something like that again. It could have ended differently. I could have died.

I could have died.

The good news is this this book can give you answers wherever you’re at with your skill level. In my case, I needed more practice at wet exit and recovery. A lot more practice. To the point that it becomes second nature to fall out, flip the boat, and jump back in. I also needed to recognize a wild river when I see one from the satellite. And most importantly, to never go alone on a river like that again. To quote my friend Ben on a similar note, “I lived and I learned.”

Since that trip, I have only done solo trips on easier Class I-II rivers in the Midwest and east coast, usually at the end of the summer when the levels are low. Appalachian rivers like the Shenandoah are nearly all pool-drop flows, allowing for easier recovery between the rapids. And many of them are commercially run, meaning that outfitters are already proactively clearing them of strainers and debris, for pretty obvious reasons. But still, I remind myself that paddling solo will always make me inherently more vulnerable to accidents, and that I need to be extremely cautious. Also, I won’t be running the Gauley in my raft.

But most importantly, I’m due for a swiftwater rescue course – for the benefit of myself and others.

In scuba diving, they teach us that the primary objective of any dive is always to get everybody back safe and unhurt. This is my primary goal of any river trip – for myself and the others to get through it safely. The Packraft Handbook by Luc Mehl explains how. From novice to veteran, boaters of all skill levels can benefit from the knowledge that it offers. So let’s make the #cultureofsafety a worthwhile goal this paddling season.

https://thingstolucat.com/packrafthandbook/
https://swiftwatersafetyinstitute.com/ssi-courses/


Adventures with Kit

Adventures with Kit

Meet Kit, my Lensball.

This glass ball is something of a travel companion that I started using a couple years ago. It can be very powerful as a foreground subject, capturing and rafracting the surrounding light in many different situations. In my case, I tend to gravitate towards ambient light, often times in front of neon signs or a city skyline when I use it in pictures. The possibilities are endless so long as there is a background to set the stage for light to travel – from source to glass, from glass to sensor. From sensor to disk, and from disk to Instagram. Because this ball is all about the Instagram. It’s all for the likes.

We had some interactive art installations earlier this year, Wndr Museum and Hebru Brantley’s Nevermore Park, that both offered a wide array of photo ops for a ball such as she. On other occasions I went around Chicago and shot the Lensball in front of sculptures or downtown architecture. And other times I just found something random to use, like the hydroponic basil jungle that is my roommate’s Aerogarden.

When this is all over and we can travel safely again, I imagine Kit will be ready for the city lights of Vegas.


Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore

…continued from Sleeping Bear Dunes

The Upper Peninsula of Michigan is a beautiful area for many reasons, notably for the pristine shoreline of Pictured Rocks, a national lakeshore extending for 42 miles along the coast of Lake Superior. I spent half the day driving up there from Sleeping Bear to spend a couple of days camping and exploring the park. I had enough time that afternoon to hike the Chapel Loop, a 10 mile route outlining the most dramatic section of lakeside cliffs.

I parked at the trailhead and hiked through the forest for an hour, often passing by other hikers before reaching Chapel Beach and the sound of crashing water. Turning west, the trail went along numerous overlooks for five miles. I often stopped to photograph the dramatic cliffsides as tour boats passed below. Eventually I reached Mosquito Beach on the far end of the circuit and turned south on a two mile uphill hike to my car.

It was a great trail, but as I already learned elsewhere, a scenic shoreline can only be fully appreciated from the water. So on the next day I took an all day kayaking trip with Paddling Michigan, starting in Miners Beach just six miles west of the Mosquito trailhead. We paddled east along the steadily rising cliffside, where already the cliffs were layered in different colorful minerals. Sections of them included a layer of gravel left behind by glaciers of another age, grinding and burying moraine into the ancient bedrock.

The water was a translucent jade color illuminated in a bright sun as it slowly shifted about in the calm morning. We passed over a shipwreck, which I couldn’t see very well from the boat. But I did get some video footage of the wooden planks of the ship under the flickering sunbeams. There were other wrecks in the area as well, due to Lake Superior’s potentially treacherous weather patterns. I wasn’t at all surprised to find out that this area has its share of dive sites.

We stopped for lunch on the shore for an hour and then continued on past Mosquito Beach. Here, the cliff points were the most dramatic, rising up to 200 feet above the water. We paddled underneath arches, into cliffside mini-caves, and one small tunnel that waves had carved into the rock wall. I understood why more daring people have taken bigger expeditions into places like Alaska’s Inside Passage, where they can explore its coves, islands, and beaches day in and out. The sport of sea kayaking offers an epic, yet peaceful opportunity to any adventurer looking to find their coastal frontier.

Passing Grand Portal point, we made a straight mile to Chapel Beach, where several people made a 60 foot leap off of a nearby jump rock. The rest of us shored our kayaks as they were already getting loaded onto a shuttle boat. Then we made a three mile hike on the Chapel Trail back to the parking lot.

Great as it was, I barely saw a quarter of the Pictured Rocks shoreline. I have no idea when, but a 42 mile backpacking hike from end to end would be a great way to follow up on this tour.


Sleeping Bear Dunes

Sleeping Bear Dunes

If there was ever a Class 0, it would be the Crystal River in northern Michigan. True to its name, this flatwater river is like a sheet of glass no more than a foot above the sandy riverbed, meandering its way through a dense wood of evergreen to the lakeside vacation town of Glen Arbor. Every summer weekend, an outfitter in the town shuttles people to a boat launch a few miles up the road. I try to avoid spending money just to paddle, and hiked up there on my own.

I set up my raft and got in, and immediately enjoyed the calm and steady current as it made its way through the woods. Many places were a foot deep or less, but usually just deep enough not to scrape my raft on the bottom as I dug my paddle into the sand and grit. I passed several families and on more than one occasion saw kids paddling by themselves out ahead. The truth is that you would have to actually try to screw up on this river.

After about two hours I got to the takeout, packed up, and got a fish and chips dinner at a restaurant close by – the benefits of paddling next to a tourist town.

My plan was to packraft for three days on this vacation – first on the Crystal River, then for two days on the Boardman, a bigger Class II river south of Traverse City. For the past 16 years, the Boardman has undergone a major dam removal project, so far removing three of its four decommissioned dams from the river. I had the idea to spend two days paddling through it with my packraft to see the grassy fields left behind from what were once artificial lakes, and to document the recovering ecosystems. So on the second day, I parked at a river takeout south of the city and hiked the River Road upstream.

Eventually the road crossed over the river and I got a good look at what I was actually dealing with. It rained a lot in the last night, and that river was high. And fast. That along with the fact that camping in the rain already had me in a bad mood, gave me an uneasy feeling about going any further. If I were to go around a bend at that speed and run into a strainer, I don’t know if I would be ready for it. Further on were Class II rapids that I knew nothing about, and also likely higher and faster from the rainstorm. I didn’t want to run it today and end up in the paper tomorrow. So I turned back.

Determined to make something of the day, I got lunch in Glen Arbor and spent the afternoon hiking the trail systems around the Sleeping Bear Dunes. It is a scenic series of sand dunes that span three miles from west to east on the shoreline, with sand bluffs overlooking Lake Michigan and the Manitou Islands across the water. In non-Covid times, you could take a ferry out to them for more secluded camping and backpacking.

I hiked the dune trails as they went along the ridges and scrawling vegetation, occasionally passing dried out husks that were once trees. As the sun fell in the west I parked my car at the main lot and made the Dune Hike straight up and over the ridge system, climbing five or six steep hills before reaching the beach on the far end. I had done this trail before, but it still felt like forever as I cleared each hill only to see another one.

I sat by the water and waited for the late day sun to come out of the clouds that loomed just above the horizon, longing for another sundown of another where and when – one that won’t happen until I’m allowed to return to Europe. It has been a strange and unprecedented year where I had just about everything planned out of where I would go, and what I would do when I got there – only to have life get in the way and change all if it. This week long trip in Michigan might well be the only vacation of note that I take. I, like the rest of America – whether they want to accept it or not – have to wait until we’re not sick anymore. But I’m nothing if not thankful as I allow these times to pass, as surely they shall. There are other worlds than these.

All at once, the sun fell behind the water. I packed up my lensball and camera and made a good pace back in the fading daylight. It was fully dark by the time I reached my car.

This roadtrip continues in the Upper Peninsula.


VR Skydiving with iFly Chicago

VR Skydiving with iFly Chicago

The travel enthusiast in me is always Google searching the digital landscape for new ideas. Whenever I’m not out doing something, I’m thinking about it. And I’ve been getting curious about the idea of Travel VR, where the wild places of the world are brought to you in an immersive digital format. iFly Indoor Skydiving has flight simulation centers all across the country. Using a powerful wind tunnel, they harness the feeling of a freefall with VR gear, simulating skydives over Hawaii, Dubai, California, and the Swiss Alps. It can be the next practical option if, like me, you won’t be making it to Dubai anytime soon.

I went to the Lincoln Park, Chicago location recently after work. After a short orientation video, I suited up for my first “jump”. The first two flights were without VR – the intent being to get first time jumpers comfortable floating on an upward blast of wind. The instructor stood in the middle to help stabilize and keep me from flailing and spinning around in the tunnel. The main thing they told me to do is relax – something I never do the first time with anything. I gradually got more stable with each flight, but my first visit overall was tense and challenging. For the last flight, the instructor gave me a VR headset and loaded up the Hawaii jump. I floated in the middle of the tunnel, watching a 60 second video of divers over the Hawaiian coast. It was cool, but I was still too in my head to be totally in the moment.

I came back a week later and felt better overall. I could finally relax in a fixed position. When the instructor noticed, he started showing me maneuvers, like how to turn simply by moving my hands. It’s always a fun challenge to test my physical and mental limits against natural forces – whether they be water, gravity, or in this case, wind. For the VR simulation, I tried the wingsuit jump in the Swiss Alps. It was altogether better and more immersive than before, as I pretended to glide between the high alpine ridges, nearly skirting the treetops like a daredevil.

This was all fun and will have to do until I get the chance to dive for real over blue water. If it works out, it might happen later this year.


The Prismatica Timelapse

The Prismatica Timelapse

Earlier this spring I created a timelapse video of the interactive Prismatica installation at Navy Pier, Chicago. Design and installation was by Raw Design and Quartier Des Spectacles. If you wish to find out more about their work, you can visit their websites:

rawdesign.ca
quartierdesspectacles.com

This installation is no longer on display in Chicago, but might appear again in another city. When I last checked, they said that the next location is TBD. I hope I see it again somewhere, this project was a lot of fun.


Paddling the Chicago River

Paddling the Chicago River

It is my belief that the best place to see any canyon is from the middle of the river. The urban canyon of the Chicago River is no exception. It goes around the downtown loop for three miles, passing by the tallest and best known skyscrapers in our city. You, traveler, would love the shit out of this.

I finally went down there to paddle it after about 8 months of river withdrawal. I had just got out of PT because I sprained my rotator a couple months ago trying to roll a kayak in a city pool. As much as I try to avoid it, I usually do end up wasting time looking for answers on garbage websites like WebMD. Luckily my shoulder isn’t rotting off like those pseudo-medical clickbait websites want me to think.

But I did end up doing the right thing and got it checked out. I learned some good PT exercises, which I’m still doing to rebuild and strengthen my shoulders and core muscles. Now, the first weekend of May, was a perfect Sunday afternoon. I couldn’t stand it any longer. I had to get out on the water.

I went down to the riverwalk where Urban Kayaks has a launch site along the river. I got in and paddled about three miles past the Drumpf Tower, Wilco Buildings, the infamous Dave Matthews Bridge, Civic Opera House, Sears Tower, and 21 bridges before I finally took out at the public ramp at Chinatown.

The air was warm, lake water was cold, and there was some unpredictable tunnel wind. In a kayak it doesn’t really matter, but in a packraft the wind is either your ally or your nemesis. I fought some bad headwind for the last mile right up to the end. But at least the shoulder didn’t give me any grief. And the scenic buildings towering over my head made everything worth it.

Come out and do it. You can rent from Urban Kayaks at either of their sites at an hourly rate. I’ve rented from them before and they have treated me well. Or if you have your own inflatable toy like I do, they will let you launch it out for $10.

And in case you’re wondering, no, the river isn’t the cleanest one around. The city regularly runs cleanup boats along the river all summer, but you still might see a Coke bottle, cigarette butts, and an occasional tennis ball. This doesn’t stop hordes of people from using the tour boats, kayaks, and riverwalk all summer long. It’s a city river, and it’s what it is.

Just up the street from the riverwalk is all the protein your body needs after a river trip. At the end of the day, nothing tastes better than Da Lobsta’s Surf & Turf Lobster Roll with a hot basket of hush puppies and Sriracha Mayo. Mow it down and thank me later.

Make the river part of your Chicago experience this summer. I’ll be back in August after some past due time in the great north. I’m leaving with my packraft, bike, gear, and shoulders of steel for two months of unfinished business in the boreal country. Onward to Alaska.


The Street Art of Detroit

The Street Art of Detroit

In recent years, graffiti and street art have become an important part of Detroit’s current revitalization efforts. You can find hundreds of colorful murals and sculptures decorating the city’s corridors and streets. There are projects like Heidelberg that have been around for years, but new murals like the ones in the Eastern Market District are popping up all the time. Including on my social media. I started looking through the ones most recently done at Eastern Market and knew that I was past due for a visit.

I left on a gloomy November evening and arrived at the bus station in a cold downpour at 10pm on a Friday, where I planned to spend the weekend at Hostel Detroit on the edge of the city’s up and coming Corktown neighborhood. It was a rad little place that I had enjoyed once before, and then suffered a post-wedding hangover (100% worth it, cause I take it for my friends). The hostel rented out cruiser bikes, one of which I left with early Saturday morning on my own self-guided art tour across the city.

Murals In the Market

I locked my bike on the edge of the Eastern Market, a bustling marketplace north of downtown, to check out all of this sweet ass shit. Last September, community organizers joined together and held the Murals In The Market, a nine day event where 45 different graffiti artists converged in the city and transformed the streets into a vast, colorful gallery of kickass murals. Paintings of all different colors and styles could be seen at every turn.

Some were twenty or thirty feet high, while others like “Maybe One Day” by Ron Zakrin were hidden behind back alley corners. The message of his work was a clear one: That maybe one day our machines of war will become artifacts, and the kids will play among them.

Other favorites included the one below by Hebru Brantley, a Chicago based artist who incorporates urban themed cartoon imagery into his work. There was Shark Toof, whom whether by mural, canvas or print, can bring many colorful, horrifying sharks to life.

Just look at that how devastating that mural is. That is an insane, raging red megalodon emerging from a sea of blood. It is the making of black metal albums, shattered femurs, radiation sickness, and nightmares. It could bite the head off of Moby Dick and shit out the pieces in a straight line. Unbelievable.

There were too many good murals to capture and name, but the work from Ron Zakrin, Hebru Brantley, Shark Toof, 0uizi, and fel3000ft as posted above was as brilliant as it was engaging. And there is plenty more to see on their website, muralsinthemarket.com. I got back on my bike and went along the bumpy side streets for a few miles to check out Heidelberg.

The Heidelberg Project

A neighborhood art project now thirty years in the making, the Heidelberg Project on the city’s east side is a living and breathing work of art in the community. It was founded by Tyree Guyton in 1986, who felt compelled to overcome the hardship and poverty in his neighborhood by using a paintbrush to transform his street into what we see today.

Despite having suffered a number of demolitions and counts of arson, the project continues to grow. Its houses and sculptures have evolved and persevered; what has been razed has been built upon, and have become some of my favorite places on the street. Like the basement I got a picture of below – formerly the Dollhouse – where a naked doll sits atop a church pulpit in front of some chairs and a large basket of blue shoes.

I spent an hour taking in hundreds of polka dots, stuffed animals, chairs, shoes, clocks, records, and cars. The skeleton and sign below was my favorite piece of the day. When I was finally done, I unlocked my bike from a traffic sign and rode it back across town.

To celebrate their 30th Anniversary, The Heidelberg Project will be hosting special events for the next 30 months. Info will be available on their website, heidelberg.org. You have no reason not to rent a bicycle, ride across town, and check it out.

I got back to the hostel in the late afternoon and walked down to Michigan Avenue, the main bustling corridor of Corktown, to get dinner. Slow’s BarBq was packed, as I figured it would be on a Saturday afternoon. I almost didn’t bother going in until some people came out and the scent of the place got the best of me and my inner carnivore. I hadn’t eaten all day and I was mad hungry. As in like, insane raging megalodon hungry. The day ended with some finely smoked brisket and Alaskan Pumpkin Ale.

Across the street, the red clouds of the winter sunset reflected from the newly installed windows of the Michigan Central Station. Inside, the lights of a freight elevator could be seen, like a symbol of things to come. Good things are happening in the Motor City, and its art scene is clearing the way.


My Last Visit to Hot Doug’s

My Last Visit to Hot Doug’s

I wasn’t always this interested in culinary exploration. But Chicago has changed the way I think about food. Since I moved here, I have discovered that some of the most brilliant, innovative artists that our city has to offer are in our restaurants and our kitchens. And their creations are among the best that you will find anywhere.

Among the very best of them is Hot Doug’s – our wildly popular hot dog restaurant in the Avondale neighborhood. For 13 years, owner Doug Sohn has served a variety of amazing hot dogs and sausages, including classic Chicago-style dogs, Polish sausage, and beer soaked bratwurst, to thousands of loyal, hungry people.

But what really makes his restaurant stand out is the gourmet specialty selection. His menu rotates twelve different gourmet sausages of all different kinds of game meats, aged cheeses, sauces, and other random flavorful combinations and toppings, all on a hot dog bun.

Over the years, I have patronized his store for things like a Thanksgiving Turducken Sausage with pumpkin cream and cranberry-infused gourmet cheese, a smoked shrimp and pork hot dog with Cajun shrimp remoulade, goat cheese and honey drizzle. And sometimes just a plain old Chicago style hot dog with all the decorations would suit me just fine.

He is best known for his world famous Foie Gras Hot Dog. A foie gras and sauternes duck sausage with a spread of truffle aioli, chunks of foie gras mousse, and a dash of fleur de sel sea salt. It is as legendary as the culinary kings of old, and is to this day one of the best things I have ever eaten.

It is amazing enough to capture the attention of Anthony Bourdain, who had nothing but great things to say about it when he visited the restaurant. The clientele has done nothing but grow ever since, thanks to the publicity.

Last May, owner Doug Sohn announced on his website that he planned to close the store for good in October, giving his patrons five months to enjoy whatever they could from his one of a kind menu. Since then, the lines have been getting exponentially more and more insane. On a weekday morning, I used to wait ten minutes in line, but after the announcement it took me two hours to get inside. I went once on a Saturday at the end of June and got through the line three hours later. And it hasn’t stopped. It has doubled, tripled, and quadrupled in size over the summer.

Having just got back from a five week trip to Virginia, I wanted to go one last time, and it was now or never. So last Saturday, Mike and I agreed to meet in line at 8am. Word on the street was that the Saturday wait time was about 8.5 hours (yes, I’m serious) if you fail to beat the morning surge, so I bumped it ahead to 7 for safe measure. That would give us 3.5hrs at least to be optimistic.

We lucked out. When I got there, the sun was coming up and only ten people stood ahead of me. The crowds started showing up exponentially over the next few hours, backing up to what looked like a 6 hour wait around 9am. It didn’t stop there; the line kept going and going. So fuck yeah, we got this.

Our wait turned out just shy of 4 hours, and was actually quite a bit of fun, thanks to our knowing we earned the best spot in the line. Well, that and the bloody mary kit that the ladies in front of us generously shared to help kill the time. Why not tailgate to such a noteworthy occasion?

The last two hours blew by as Mike and I hung out with our new tailgating friends. Like us, they enjoyed exploring the food scene. They claimed to meet regularly to go on foodie adventures about the city, as Mike and I also do (though I hesitate to think of myself as a “foodie”, since it goes against my beliefs as a cowboy).

Before we knew it, it was 10:30 and the doors opened. The bittersweet feeling of closure was already starting to distract me from the menu as I walked in for the last time. Doug was at the front counter taking orders and giving Cindy a hard time for having never been to Hot Doug’s before. His banter was as sharp as a cleaver, and he could easily get the customers laughing, especially at the expense of one or two people. “What am I gonna do, get a bad review on Yelp?”

Mike and I put in our orders and sat down with our new friends at a table for five.

We both got a Foie Gras Hot Dog for obvious reasons. In addition, we got four more sausages and shared halves of them: The Smoked and Spicy Alligator Sausage with Crayfish and Shrimp Remoulade and Raspberry-infused Bellavitano Cheese, the Smoked Shrimp and Pork with Creole Mustard, Hominy Grits and Goat Cheese, a Veal Saltimbocca Sausage with Sage Mustard, Sheep’s Milk Brigante Cheese and Fried Prosciutto, and a Lamb and Pork Belly with Onion Butter, Brie Cheese and sweet fucking Tomato Preserves.

I don’t even know what half of this stuff is. But it all tasted as awesome as it sounds.

And I’m not one to waste any time savoring the flavors, fuck that. Even if they are out of this world. A few months ago, I visited Au Cheval, a great diner in the west loop that is well known among locals for their cheeseburgers. As soon as I finished one, a guy came up to me and told me that that was the fastest he had ever seen anybody eat a burger. And he’s right, when something is that good, I will mow it the fuck down.

Mike is pretty much the same way. We finished off our share of the sausages with some room left for duck fat fries. The ladies finished their decadent array of gourmet food and we all got up, satisfied and sad all the same that our favorite place in town will soon be gone forever.

When I walked outside, the line was at least as long as a football field.

But don’t let that discourage you from going. You still have time up to October 3rd, so make the most of it. They open at 10:30, but the line will already be there before. Do what we did and get there at 7, maybe even earlier at this point. The line is exponential as far as I can tell, so if you’re thinking of going on the closing day, you’ll probably have to camp out to beat the surge.

Do whatever you have to do. I promise you it’s worth it.

We will always have great places to eat in Chicago. But I don’t know if we’ll ever have something like this again. I am certain that Hot Doug’s will be remembered for many years to come as a truly, truly quintessential culinary venture.

#foodporn courtesy of Mike Bacos