a date in Chicago

About 11PM on our last night in Chicago, Dan and I went out on a date. We had learned that a wonderful jazz bar, Pops for Champagne, http://www.popsforchampagne.com/ was supposed to move from its long time Lakeview location to the River North in early May. We did not want to go up to Lakeview; we wanted to stay within a few blocks of the House of Blues so we could quickly get to the kids if they needed us. But since we thought that Pops for Champagne was only a few blocks away, we decided to head to the new location.

Now, the River North area is Chicago's primary night life area, with live music everywhere. So as we walked up to the new location for Pops for Champagne we saw at least one (and usually more than one) place with live music per block. A few examples (just ones whose names I can even remember, there were many many many more):

http://www.bluechicago.com/

http://www.kazbarchicago.com/

http://www.redfishamerica.com/

http://www.redheadpianobar.com/

http://www.howlatthemoon.com/

We got up to where Pops for Champagne had supposedly moved, only to find that they had not moved in yet. So we talked about which of the various places had the music that had sounded the best from the outside - and we decided to go back to the lobby bar of our hotel, where a great blues band had been playing!

But walking around River North at night - seeing all of the people, hearing music pouring out from all of those places - it was well worth the walk.

The Kaz Bar at the House of Blues is beautiful. They have stained glass windows, and comfortable couches to relax on. The drinks were pricey, but they did not charge a cover, and the band playing that night was very good. I had my first ever martini - Black Cherry flavor. Now that was something for a girl who usually only drinks a few glasses of wine a year.