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Festival Celebrates the Chicago River on the Coldest Day of the Year, with a Side of Pigs in a Blanket and Malört

Daniel Hautzinger
An overhead view of the Wild Mile floating wetland on the Chicago River
The Wild Mile is a floating wetland in the Chicago River near Goose Island. Credit: Dave Burk @ SOM

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The period from January 17 to 20 is the coldest in Chicago, on average. So January 17 is the perfect day to spend some time outside, no? That’s what Urban Rivers thinks. They’re hosting their free Royal Chicago River Pigs-in-a-Blanket Winter Festival that day featuring food, drinks, company, and the joy of nature in the city to warm you. The titular pigs in blankets consist of warm Gunthrop Farms sausages, wrapped in pastry blankets, cooked over a fire by Javauneeka Jacobs of Frontera Grill.

“Creating opportunity to get people outside in nature in the winter is important,” says Nick Wesley, the executive director of Urban Rivers, calling it a “travesty” that Chicago lacks many outdoor winter activities. “Especially if we’re putting all of this effort into this park, having it as something that’s only really used half a year doesn’t really sit well.”

That park is the Wild Mile on the North Branch Canal of the Chicago River, where the festival  will take place. Located behind the REI at 905 W. Eastman Street across from Goose Island in Lincoln Park, the Wild Mile is a floating wetland that features boardwalks as well as manmade habitat for local wildlife that’s full of native plants. It’s the flagship project of Urban Rivers, which has also built smaller floating gardens in Bubbly Creek in McKinley Park and at River Park in Albany Park.

The motivating idea is to try to “emulate a natural river,” says Wesley, “within an urbanized ecosystem.”

Three years in, the Wild Mile seems to be achieving that goal – and is providing a model to other cities with industrialized rivers around the world. There’s evidence that it’s improving water quality, in addition to drawing animals such as beavers, turtles (such as the internet-famous Chonkosaurus, whose impressive girth may have been fed in part by the plants of the Wild Mile), fish, and over 100 species of birds. All of those creatures and the plants that feed and harbor them continue their lives outside during the winter, so as far as Urban Rivers sees it, humans may as well join them.  To help fight against the human instinct to stay indoors this time of year, the festival will have  juice, Dark Matter coffee, and even Jeppson’s Malört to fortify folks against the cold.

“Ecologically, there’s a lot going on in the winter,” says Sage Rossman, Urban Rivers’ community outreach and programs manager. Animals that don’t hibernate forage for seeds, while raptors hunt for them among the plant stalks, which are dormant but offer shelter to insects. You can still fish, and there’s still birdwatching – including some species such as mergansers that only stop by the Wild Mile for a short period in the winter while migrating south, according to Wesley.

Says Rossman, “There’s a wide range of ways to engage if you’re willing to brave the weather.”

Winter is when Urban Rivers volunteers hunt for pregnant freshwater mussels in forest preserve water sources in order to cultivate young mussels indoors before bringing them to the Wild Mile to try to re-establish the mussels in the more industrialized parts of the river. “I think we’ve gotten close to 2,000 there,” Wesley says.

Sure, plunging your hands into near-freezing water to find pregnant mussels may not be as appealing as summertime Urban Rivers volunteer opportunities such as kayak trash clean-up or garden maintenance. But it’s another necessary part of rehabilitating this stretch of river. Nature doesn’t stop for winter.


The Royal Chicago River Pigs-in-a-Blanket Winter Festival takes place from 6:00 to 10:00 am at the Wild Mile on the river behind the REI at 905 W. Eastman Street. The event is free, with donations to Urban Rivers accepted. RSVP requested.