Chicago Lyric Opera and Birding Tour

If you are interested in the Chicago Lyric Opera and Birding Tour, come and join us at Kaiyote Tours!

Chicago is a great city for everything...including urban birding!!  Even Snowy owls occasionally show up during an "irruption" year. 

Birding:  Over 400 species of birds have been identified in Chicago and because Chicago is located on Lake Michigan, it is an important flyway for nearly 200 bird species.  

History of opera in Chicago:  The first opera to be performed in Chicago was Bellini's La Sonnambula, performed in 1850.  Chicago's first opera house opened in 1865 but was destroyed by the Great Fire of Chicago in 1871. The current art deco Civic Opera House was built in 1929 and seats 3,563, making it the second-largest opera auditorium in North America, after the Metropolitan Opera House.

Lodging will be at the historic Congress Plaza Hotel.  Built in 1893 for the World's Columbian Exposition, the hotel is perfectly situated for great views of Lake Michigan and close to the best parks for birding.  The hotel is considered one of the most haunted buildings in Chicago.  

If you are not an opera lover, you can sign up for the daytime activities without the opera, there is a price deduction. 

• Dates: March 22 - 28, 2026, spots left = 5
• Group Size:  5 Travelers plus guides
• Trip Length: 7 days
• Rates: Rate per person = $4,320 (based on double occupancy, additional $800 for single). If you would like a large one-bedroom suite with a lake view, it is an extra $1,400 per room. 
• Rates include: Transport within Chicago, lodging, breakfast, lunch, dinner, event tickets, and group tours
• Not included: Airfare to Chicago O'Hare Airport (ORD)
• Adventure level:  Easy, please check the "Welcome" page for definition
• Reservations: To reserve a spot on the trip, a non-refundable 50% deposit is required, and the non-refundable balance is due six months prior to the trip

Basic Itinerary

Day 1, Sunday Fly to Chicago

• Arrival day: You will be met at the airport. 
• No scheduled activities
• Dinner depends on arrival time of participants; dinner is not included. 

Day 2, Monday

• 7:00am – 8:00am:  Morning bird walk along waterfront
• 8:00am – 9:00am:  Breakfast at hotel
• 9:00am – 12:00pm:  Birding Jackson Park (eBird list)
• 12:00pm – 1:00pm:  Lunch at Daley's 
• 1:00pm – 3:30pm:  Chicago River architecture Boat Tour 
• 3:30pm – 5:00pm:  Afternoon break
• 5:00pm:  Dinner at The Berghoff
• 8:00pm:  Evening event:  The Second City comedy club since 1959

Day 3, Tuesday

• 7:00am – 8:00am:  Morning bird walk along waterfront
• 8:00am – 9:00am:  Breakfast at hotel
• 9:00am – 12:00pm:  Birding Montrose Park Bird Sanctuary (eBird list)
• 12:00pm – 1:00pm: Lunch at Portillo's for a Chicago Dog and Twinkie day
• 1:00pm – 3:00pm:  Birding Lincoln Park (eBird list)
• 3:00pm - 5:00pm:  Afternoon break
• 5:00pm:  Dinner at Lou Malnati's Pizzeria, the best! (more than pizza, pasta and salads too)
• 7:00pm:  Chicago Lyric Opera performs El Ultimo Sueño de Frida y Diego

Day 4, Wednesday

• 7:00am – 8:00am:  Morning bird walk along waterfront
• 8:00am – 9:00am:  Breakfast at hotel
• 9:00am – 11:30am:  Visit to the Willis Tower
• 11:30am – 12:30pm:  Lunch at the AIC
• 12:30pm – 3:30pm: The Art Institute of Chicago
• 3:30pm – 5:00pm:  Afternoon break
• 5:00pm:  Dinner at the Atwood located in the Reliance Building
• 7:00pm:  Chicago Lyric Opera performs Madama Butterfly

Day 5, Thursday

• 7:00am – 8:00am:  Breakfast at hotel
• 8:00am:  Departure for the Fermilab located in Batavia, Illinois, about a 1-hour drive from our hotel. Fermilab has 6,800 acres and an eBird List.  Close by are two excellent birding areas:  The Blackwell Forest Preserve and The Morton Arboretum.  We will spend a full day in this area, and hopefully have the chance to visit the lab for a tour.  
• 4:00pm – 5:00pm:  Afternoon break
• 5:00pm:  Dinner at the original Uno's Pizza and Grill (more than pizza, steaks and salads too)
• 7:30pm:  Chicago Symphony Orchestra performs Muti conducts Tchaikovsky and Rota

Day 6, Friday

• 7:00am – 8:00am:  Breakfast at hotel
• 8:00am – 12:00pm:  Birding LaBagh Woods  
• 12:00pm – 1:00pm:  Lunch at Potbelly
• 1:00pm – 3:00pm:  Chicago Theatre tour 
• 3:00pm – 5:00pm:  Afternoon break
• 5:00pm:  Dinner at the Palmer House (invented the Chocolate Brownie)
• 8:00pm:  A performance at the Goodman, Steppenwolf, or Auditorium theater, TBD later

Day 7, Saturday Departure Day

• You will be transferred from your hotel to your departure airport

Details about events, attractions, and dinners

The Willis Tower (aka; the Sears Tower, its name for 36 years) is a 110-story, 1,450-foot (442.1 m) skyscraper in Chicago. At completion in 1973, it surpassed the World Trade Center in New York to become the tallest building in the world, a title it held for nearly 25 years.  It was the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere for 41 years, until the new One World Trade Center surpassed it in 2014. (from Wikipedia)

The Art Institute of Chicago, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and second largest art museums in the United States, after the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  The permanent collection consists of over 300,000 works of art. There is also the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, which is a world renowned art school. 

Dinners

The Atwood (located in the Reliance building): Built from 1890 - 1895, the Reliance building was the first skyscraper to have large plate glass windows make up the majority of its surface area, a design feature that would become dominant in the 20th century. It has been termed the "first comprehensive achievement" of the Chicago construction method; Its steel-frame superstructure is built atop concrete caissons sunk as much as 125 feet beneath the footing. It was one of the first skyscrapers to offer electricity and phone service in all of its offices. In its first few decades, it provided office space for merchants and health professionals, including Al Capone's dentist. (from Wikipedia)

Lou Malnati's Pizzeria: (pasta and salads too). Lou Malnati got his start in the 1940's working in Chicago's first deep dish pizzeria, Pizzeria Uno. Some believed that Rudy Malnati, the father of Lou Malnati, invented the deep-dish pizza. Lou Malnati took his pizza expertise to Lincolnwood, a northern suburb of Chicago, where he and his wife Jean opened the first Lou Malnati's Pizzeria in 1971. Lou Malnati's is true Chicago style pizza, and its deep-dish pizza is referred to as a "pie." and is made with a thin crust of pizza dough laid in a seasoned deep-dish pizza pan and filled with ingredients. There are 56 locations in Chicago.

Uno's Pizza and Grill (Pizza, steaks, seafood, pasta, salads, and more). Here in lies the controversy:  Who invented Chicago's deep-dish pizza?  The first Uno's was established in 1943 by Ike Sewell and Ric Riccardo, in the River North neighborhood of Chicago. Sewell claimed to have originated the deep-dish pizza style, but many believe that Rudy Malnati, the father of Lou Malnati, invented the deep-dish pizza while working for Sewell.  Sewell opened two additional restaurants in response to Pizzeria Uno's popularity. Pizzeria Due opened one block north of the original Pizzeria Uno location in 1955 (Uno and Due are Italian for one and two).

The Palmer House: Opened September 26, 1871 and burned down 13 days later on October 9, 1871 in the Great Chicago Fire. Palmer immediately rebuilt and constructed one of the fanciest hotels worldwide in post-fire Chicago. Built mainly of iron and brick, the hotel was widely advertised as "The World's Only Fireproof Hotel".  The Palmer House was the city's first hotel with elevators and the first hotel with electric light bulbs and telephones in the guest rooms. It has also been dubbed the longest continuously operating hotel in North America.  The Chocolate Brownie was invented by Bertha Palmer in 1893.

The Berghoff: Family owned and operated since 1898. The legacy can be traced back to 1870, when Herman Berghoff emigrated from Germany to America. After stints working on cotton and sugar cane plantations—and even time spent performing at Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show—Herman opened his own brewery in Indiana. When the World’s Fair came to Chicago in 1893, Herman Berghoff set up a stand in the Midway Plaisance and sold his beers to people entering and exiting the fair. His success at the fair prompted him to consider a more permanent place to sell his beer in Chicago. Thus, The Berghoff opened its doors in 1898. Beers were sold for a nickel, and they came with a side sandwich, free!

Sometimes we might eat, or at least visit:

The Green Door Tavern in Uptown:  In 1872, immediately following the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, James McCole built a two-story balloon frame wooden structure. Following the fire, Chicago passed a fire code ordinance prohibiting construction of wooden commercial buildings in the Central Business District. The Green Door is one of the few remaining frame structures built prior to the fire ordinance. The "racking" (leaning) of the building occurred shortly after the building settled and has been that way for over 100 years. The green door has been serving alcohol since 1921.  The "green door" signified a speakeasy during prohibition and the business has retained the name ever since.  Some of the interior design and fixtures date back to 1921.   

Eastern Meadowlark