Illinois
The garden is home to 255 bird species and has year-round hiking trails, as well as hosting weekend cooking demonstrations by well-known chefs from May 25 to October 6.
Though it's a stiff $25 per car to get in, feel free to take an Uber and walk in for free.
15.61 MILES
Built in 1914, Wrigley Field – aka the Friendly Confines – is the second-oldest baseball park in the major leagues. It’s home to the Chicago Cubs and…
27.07 MILES
The MSI is the largest science museum in the Western hemisphere and a place to completely geek out. Highlights include a WWII German U-boat nestled in an…
20.6 MILES
The second-largest art museum in the country, the Art Institute houses a treasure trove from around the globe. The collection of impressionist and…
20.46 MILES
There's free admission to Millennium Park, the playful heart of the city. It shines with whimsical public art, both permanent and temporary exhibits, and…
20.41 MILES
Willis Tower is Chicago's tallest building (and one of the world's loftiest). Breathe deeply during the ear-popping, 70-second elevator ride to the 103rd…
Field Museum of Natural History
21.57 MILES
The Field Museum houses some 30 million artifacts and includes everything but the kitchen sink – beetles, mummies, gemstones, Bushman the stuffed ape –…
20.15 MILES
Half-mile-long Navy Pier is one of Chicago's most-visited attractions, sporting a 196ft Ferris wheel and other carnival rides ($9 to $18 each), an IMAX…
National Museum of Mexican Art
21.25 MILES
Founded in 1982, this vibrant museum – the largest Latinx arts institution in the US – has become one of the city’s best. The vivid permanent collection…
6.74 MILES
This is the third-largest holocaust museum in the world, after those in Jerusalem and Washington, DC. Besides its haunting Nazi-era rail car and its…
7.5 MILES
The striking white temple, surrounded by public gardens, was completed in 1953 and is one of eight continental Baha'i temples worldwide. Guests are free…
8.92 MILES
This small but worthwhile 2017 addition to Evanston's cultural landscape houses a two-fold collection of American stained glass, mostly recovered from…
8.99 MILES
A glassy departure from the standard campus architectural vernacular, Northwestern University's art museum hosts diverse, sometimes provocative…
9.8 MILES
In case you're wondering, a Toby jug is a ceramic pitcher shaped like a chubby old guy wearing a tri-cornered hat and 18th-century garb. Or at least that…
12.22 MILES
Who knew? Ben Franklin liked to be flogged, and Egypt’s Queen Hatshepsut had a foot fetish. The museum reveals this and more in its displays of leather,…
12.97 MILES
The entrance gate to Chicago’s largest cemetery is worth the trip alone. Designed by WW Boyington (the architect who created the Water Tower on Michigan…
8. Swedish American Museum Center
13.55 MILES
The permanent collection at this small storefront museum focuses on the lives of the Swedes who originally settled Chicago. Check out the items people…