Traffic, traffic!!!

10 9 09

Time to leave Chicago but first we had to check out Andersonville, the Swedish neighborhood of Chicago. By 1900 Chicago had 49.000 Swedish born residents and they had 96,000 children! Only Stockholm had more Swedes. Andersonville celebrates Midsummer Day, which thousands attend, and Lucia is also celebrated.

This area was not far away but it still was slow going. It rained but Luna helped. We found the bakery and Jalil waited in the car. It was called Swedish Bakery and they offered plenty of really Swedish looking pastries. They only use real ingredients. I bought mazariner, a small tosca cake. bulle, cookies (hazelnut, almond, bondkakor) and a heavy bread. She wrapped the delicate things in little cardboard boxes with a narrow, white and red string, and a label Swedish Bakery with address, website (swedishbakery.com), etc. There had only been two owners of this bakery.

When I returned there had been an incident of some sort with a man down in the street. The ambulance came and swooped up the man quickly and I never did get a handle on the story. But we forgot to look at the area and drove off towards the freeway. That was another slow slog. And once on the freeway, it was also so slow all the way through the city. A good time to talk on the phone - Homeirah and Pam. Susu called us and we had a nice conversation. She was on her way to her favorite coffee place with David.

It still rained heavily and there was roadwork everywhere so we moved SLOWLY. Our goal was to go to a certain intersection in Indiana. Jalil had left Ft. Wayne 50 years ago and he drove Hwy 24 until he came to the Route 66 intersection. There were three lanes and he was in the middle. The one on the right went to Chicago and the one on the left went to San Francisco (He was accepted at a school in both cities.) He could not decide which one to take. The traffic light changed three times before he turned left!! Imagined how different our lives would have been, had he turned right.

Jalil wanted to find this intersection but Route 66 is not on the map now. Well, Jalil decided it should be Hwy 65 which crosses 24 on the way to Indianapolis. We found that intersection after much problem getting on 65 as there was roadwork and there was a detour at Hwy 94 which Triptic (AAA) and Luna had trouble with and we ended up in a poor neighborhood in Gary.

The traffic on 65 was bad, too, and at one point it stopped but we were able to get off and have lunch. Jalil likes to sit at an old fashioned counter so we ended up there. I later saw that the sign said FOR DRIVERS. Smoking was allowed there. One man called his mother while he was smoking after his lunch. I tried to listen but did not hear much but he was talking about health insurance and he was telling his mother that Medicare was going to be cut or something like that.

Well that intersection did not seem right. We drove around a little and there was no one to ask questions so we continued on 24 (towards Fr. Wayne). At a gas station in a small town where got gas, we asked if they knew where Route 66 used to go. There was an older customer near me and I asked him. He and another man consulted with each other and decided it had to be in Peoria, Illinois, far west of where we were. Jalil wanted to go back but it was going to get dark soon so he changed his mind. The gas station woman said she was glad we had talked to these men as they were truck drivers so they knew a lot. She did not have a clue what Jalil was talking about. She was too young!

So we headed east for some hundred miles and it was getting dark. Jackie called and kept us company. It was really nice. She talked to us until we had to concentrate on what Luna said about finding Best Western, as it was a little complicated for Luna there. It sometimes says "Arriving at destination on right" but it is sometimes not right there but somewhere nearby.

No pictures were taken this day - a first!