Chicago to Columbus drive: 23 ranked stops, break in Fair Oaks

Jonathan Brooks's intimate chef-driven counterpart offering a refined, frequently rotating menu of technically precise small plates in an artful dining room. Order: Chef's rotating plates.

Unfussy fine dining and wine bar with an oft-changing seasonal menu sourced from local farms and artisan makers in a casual house setting. Order: Seasonal farm menu.

The acclaimed brunch diner formerly Milktooth, inventive scratch cooking. (Fletcher Place)

One block from the track, a go-to for steaks and the local tenderloin. (Speedway)

a "Little Niagara" preserve near Dayton

Bison occupy two enclosed pastures amid more than 1,600 acres of restored prairie and wetland, while the Nature Center holds a 53-foot living stream stocked with Big Darby Creek organisms. The pairing makes the diversion more than a generic metro-park walk.

Lake Michigan dunes & beaches

Logan Square neighborhood pioneer since 1999 serving seasonal market-to-table cooking that earned a James Beard hospitality award. Order: Farmer's breakfast.

Illinois’s largest independent brewery, with a lively Logan Square brewpub

three steep dunes over Lake Michigan

a boardwalk fall tucked in suburban Columbus

Beloved soul-food destination for Southern comfort classics. (Northeast Side)

a dramatic dolomite gorge on the Little Miami

Craft beer, burgers, and pub plates minutes from the park entrances, giving Indiana Dunes a proper casual dinner option beyond beach snacks.

The signature 2.3-mile trail crosses ravines and forest to a deck 100 feet above the Olentangy River. Shorter accessible river paths and a nature center provide alternatives, but the bluff overlook is not drive-up.