Spring 2022 trip - Day 1, April 23rd - Rochester to Chicago - no hike

We've been planning a 2 week vacation for this spring for 6 months.  At first it was going to be a Tennessee road trip, possibly with Jim from Vermont. Then it was going to be an all driving trip earlier in April through Illinois. Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.  That all driving itinerary was just too many miles for 2 weeks though.  Finally we revised it again to be a fly to Chicago, drive through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Arkansas and then take the train home trip.

Last night (Friday) we spent the night at the Best Western near the Rochester airport.  The airport isn't all that far from home but since we are gone 2 weeks (and not flying back) it made no sense to pay to park a car at the airport and trying to get a Lyft or Taxi in suburbia at 3 AM didn't sound like a good idea.  So we stayed and ate dinner near the airport.  It was a relatively relaxing way to start our trip.  I slept well at first but woke up around 2:15 am and didn't get back to sleep so I got out of bed at 3 am Eastern.  Everything about our flights (1 to Detroit then Detroit to Chicago) went really well and they seemed so fast.  This was great because Brian really doesn't enjoy flying and hadn't flown in a few years.

Once we were on the ground at O'Hare we needed to take another Lyft to get to a suburban car rental place to avoid most of the outrageous 700 dollars of tax that a rental in the city of Chicago would have incurred.  We had a very calm and relaxing Lyft driver who took back roads to avoid tolls which made for a slower drive but suited us well.  Unfortunately when we were requesting the Lyft car I had googled Enterprise rent-a-car Naperville and when I saw that it was on Ogden road I punched that address into Lyft. Turns out there are FIVE Enterprises in Naperville and two of them are on Ogden road and I had us dropped off at the wrong one.  The driver for the 'wrong' location dropped us off at the right one which was nice.  Unlike at home, they had a lot of cars to choose from at this location and I was able to choose a Nissan Maxima which is one of my favorite non luxury cars.

We watched a movie, Secrets of Dumbledore, with my friends Pat and Rob.  It wasn't at all a movie I cared about but it was on an enormous IMAX screen and sounded great.  I think it was a good fit for Brian and Rob at least so that was good.  After the movie we had an indulgent dinner at a Sushi place.  It was a very full but enjoyable first day of our trip, helped immensely by the upper 70 degrees weather which feels amazing.

Tomorrow we're off to Starved Rock state park, one of a few little pockets of interesting (read, not flat) geography in what can be a geographically lackluster Illinois. 

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