The Best Day of the Year: Bike the Drive

BIKE

THE

DRIVE!!

Happy Folks Biking the Drive!

See our building in the background?

Now many of you may be under the impression that Christmas or Thanksgiving or your birthday is the best day of the year. Well, if you are a Chicagoan, I must inform you that, in my humble opinion, you are wrong. Bike the Drive is by far the best day of the year in Chicago. Bike the Drive is this miraculous Sunday morning at the end of May where the entire Lake Shore Drive (LSD) is shut down to car traffic and only bikes are allowed on the drive from 5-10am. What is so special about this? Why, EVERYTHING!

• You can hear the birds chirping in the morning.
• The air is fresh, without any car exhaust.
• Chicago prioritizes exercise so much that it irritates a large number of its more lazy, car-using brethren by shutting down a main thoroughfare of the city!
• Views of the Chicago Skyline are unhindered by the usual LSD traffic.
• It is early enough in the year that there are no downtown festivals with tourists crowding our neighborhood.
  

Some of you might ask why I don't just move to a more natural, less urban setting if birds, fresh air, exercise and great views are what I'm looking for. (Some of you might also ask why the first paragraph of this post is underlined- I myself don't know, I really tried to get rid of the underlining to no avail.) My answer is that a lot of the reason Chicago is so great with great jobs, restaurants, movies, music is because of all the people! If Chicago had less traffic on LSD, that would mean fewer people with a vested interest in this city I now call home. So I know we need the traffic on LSD every other day of the year, and that only increases my love for Bike the Drive day!

Adam and I spent the day this year walking to Fox and Obel (a Chicago staple high-end grocery store, think Whole Foods for the even-more-foodie foodies) to get a lox platter (to-go) then enjoyed it along the lake with birds, trees, grass and NO TRAFFIC. It was great! Then we just walked along the lake and enjoyed our city!

Adam and the Skyline. Notice the lack of cars on LSD behind him! Beautiful!

The Art Institute with the lions decked out in Blackhawksgear (see the helmet?).
Gotta love Chicago sports! Go Hawks! All in all, a good Chicago day!