Thursday February 13 - the Field Museum

Another cloudy day but it did not feel as cold today!

Off to the Field Museum via the same bus as yesterday. It must be one of the larger Natural History Museums around. On entry, the mounted skeleton of Sue, a Tyrannosaurus Rex and the most complete found anywhere in the world, is the most dominant feature. 

I started my tour with the animals and birds and they have a wide variety of these most are real and have been preserved so that future generations will see any that become extinct.

I have never, for example, heard of a Glacier Bear before today. There were representatives of most species from around the world although there is an obvious focus on the Americas. 

Next, I went upstairs and came across the Hall of Conservation where it explained what scientists were trying to do to hep preserve what we have now. 

I then went on to see the Pacific area as I had read that they had a Maori Meeting House.

I wandered through the Pacific Spirits area and found the house. It comes from Tokomaru Bay, north of Gisborne on the east coast of the North Island of New Zealand. It is about 190 miles to the north of Napier where I live. 

Apparently, the Field Museum purchased in Hamburg, Germany in 1905. Goodness only knows what it was doing there! 

Since 1986 the descendants of the original builders have been involved in a partnership so that special events can take place in the house. 

There is a notice asking people to remove their shoes, this is the correct protocol, I can only hope that people respect this.

There is a display about the Fracking for oil in North Dakota and some of the effects it is

having on the landscape. 

There are also descriptions of how people have tried to stop it happening on their own land. It is obviously a very controversial issue, the money the oil brings on versus the land that gets destroyed!

I then made my way to the 3D Theatre to see the film about Sue. It was very interesting and the imagery they had produced of various dinosaurs was very well done. 

They are not sure if Sue is male or female but it is named after the person who found the remains. These remains were found in the badlands of South Dakota in 1990. 

Sue is 40 feet long, 13 feet high and would have weighed 7 tons when she dies at 28 years old about 67 million years ago! 

After the film I came out through the Dinosaur Hall where many skeletons are on display.

On the way out there was information about how many species are becoming extinct on a daily rate and that this process is accelerating. 

Apparently, about 80 species become extinct every day and of course there are some we know nothing about!!

On the way to the "Inside Ancient Egypt" exhibition, I walked through the "Plants of the World" area and spied one for New Zealand. 

The Egyptian exhibition was very interesting as there were a large number and variety of artifacts from tombs that have been opened. Of course, cats got a mention too and there is a wonderful spell for curing a sick cat!!

Then I went to visit the "Underground Adventure" and it was rather funny when a notice explained we would be shrunk to 1/100 of our normal size!! What happened of course was everything inside was very large. 

We wandered through areas with tree and other plant roots and were shown the life that goes on everyday under the ground. It was fascinating and there were a few characters that moved.

Three hours of the museum was enough for me, my head was spinning with all the information and my feet are beginning to feel as if they have walked miles since coming to Chicago, as they have!! 

For some reason, the song "These boots were made for walking" keeps coming to mind and I cannot get the tune out of my head! There will be more tomorrow as well. I found the Field Museum a fascinating experience and I can recommend a visit.

There were also a large number of school groups visiting the museum and it is interesting to see the special programmes that all these places offer to schools. It took me back to see the kids walking round with their notebooks busily making notes about various topics.

I had a nasty shock when I got back to my room and checked my emails, some ******* person has used my debit card number and taken US$159 out of my account for some sort of auction. i have contacted my card holder and they say if it is fraudulent, which it is, they will stop my card and issue a new one!! That will be even worse as I will not be able to get the card in the USA!! Grrr and I have some Canadian dollars on it for that part of my trip. 

What bugs me, and this is why I think there is so much trouble in the US, is that I have a PIN on that card, I have not had to sign every time I have used it and I have never had to enter my PIN!!!! 

Oh well lets see what my card holder has to say! If they give me time once the money is back on my card I can withdraw it all and then at least I will have the cash. I am not sure what will happen to the Canadian dollars, may have to convert to US and then back to Canadian when I get there, a big grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!