St. Charles, IL
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| The sign says, "You Made It! St. Charles IL" |
Exploring Outside of Chicago With Kevin and Vickie
Today we were invited to head northwest to hang with our friends Kevin and Vickie. We always have fun hanging out with Vickie and Kevin (read about the previous two times
here and
here) so we were excited about what we might see.
We started by meeting them at their place and after a quick stop for lunch we ended up at one of the larger Hindu Temples in the area and the first Hindu Temple we have visited. The
Mandir is a beautiful temple carved out of Italian marble before it was moved to it's current home in pieces and then assembled on site. There is the main temple and then surrounding buildings on a huge complex. No photos were allowed inside so I followed the rules and only took photos outside.
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| Kevin took this photo of all of us |
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| We exited through the grocery store / gift shop. We bought some snacks that were very good. |
Our next stop was St. Charles in Kane County IL. Kane is a new county for us and only one of a few that we have gotten with someone else driving. Kevin and Vickie have been to St. Charles so they already had a list of places they wanted to take us based no our likes. Our first stop really hit the nail on the head as far as likes for us. Ghoulish Mortals describes themselves as a Monster & Horror Store. They have great art for sale as well as other horror related things and they have free pinball!
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| Lots of Haunted Mansion themed art |
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| They had four machines that were on free play. |
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| Stranger Things Merch |
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| There were cool Haunted House style set pieces in their basement. |
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| They had some really cool altered plushies |
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| I played Alien for a bit. It was my first time playing this machine. |
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| American Psycho Art |
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| Outside they had some nice planters that had "gothed up" sunflowers. It was a cool touch. |
The next few stops included 2 breweries, a hotel bar, and a delicious Italian restaurant. St. Charles is a cool little town with a lot to offer and has a very walkable downtown.
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| Broke N Brix is a Brewery, Meadery, Winery, Cidery, and brewing supply shop. |
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| Our short walk to our next stop took us by this sign and I was also able to walk 2 segments of IL 31. |
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| Hotel Baker is an Historic Hotel with a bar right on the Fox River. |
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| We enjoyed the air conditioning. It was a hot day. |
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| Nice side street intersection art. |
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| We also swung by Pollyanna Brewing and Distilling. The indoors space was closed for a private party so we sat on the patio. |
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| They had a rather hoppy bitter Barleywine on tap that I liked but didn't love. |
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| Our dinner stop was Mia Modo. Their bar looked very cool but we were there for food. |
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| How about some sliced meats? |
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| I really liked this mural in the back room. |
After dinner we needed to walk off our pasta so we headed back to The Fox River to enjoy the great park space and pedestrian bridge that was built up around the river. We even heard a Common Nighthawk and got to watch swallows.
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Be You!
The St. Charles Business Alliance commissioned Chicago artist, Matthew Hoffman, founder of the “You are Beautiful” project to erect a “Be You” sculpture along the Fox River in St. Charles, IL |
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| We found a beautiful pedestrian bridge crossing The Fox River. The upper level above us was a bike path. |
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| You can see the bike path in this photo. |
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| Kevin and Vickie walking off into the sunset. Oh wait, they are our ride home! |
It was a nice walk to end a great day. Our drive back to Kevin and Vickie's was quick and then the drive home was sans traffic. We even found the perfect parking spot to avoid street sweeping on Monday. When we walked in the front door Francis was there to greet us. He was very happy for us to be home.
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