Illinois Top Things To See

• Visit the handsome 19th-century Chicago Pumping Station - a landmark that survived the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, and houses a tourist information centre.

• View the skyline from one of Chicago's many soaring skyscrapers' observation towers, including the Sears Tower (website: www.thesearstower.com) and the John Hancock Center (website: www.hancock-observatory.com).

• Take a walk along the Navy Pier (website: www.navypier.com), the largest recreational pier in the USA. Attractions include an open-air theatre, botanical gardens, the Chicago Children's Museum (website: www.chichildrensmuseum.org) plus a giant ferris wheel standing 15 storeys high and offering the best view of the famous Chicago skyline.

• Tour the intriguing earthen burial mounds at Cahokia Mounds (website: www.cahokiamounds.com), a relic of the most sophisticated prehistoric Native American community north of Mexico.

• Follow history in Springfield, where Abraham Lincoln married, began his legal career and lived in the only home he ever owned. Attractions include Lincoln's Tomb (a State Historical Site), the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum (website: www.alplm.org/home.html) and the Illinois State Museum (website: www.museum.state.il.us).

• Travel back in time at the New Salem State Park and tour a recreation of the pioneer community as it was in Lincoln's day.
 
See Contact Addresses for further tourist information.
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