The event was such a success that it broke the all-time ticket sales record for any Pokemon Go live event in North America, with 103,605 total tickets sold for the park and citywide gameplay experiences.

There were reportedly 717,363 active Pokemon Go trainers in Chicago during the weekend, with nearly 15 million Pokemon caught just within Grant Park, home of the event’s park experience where thousands of trainers gathered to take on Mega Mewtwo X and Y in unity raids during either a morning or an afternoon session at one of three assigned locations: Butler Field, the Clarence F. Buckingham Memorial Fountain or Hutchinson Fields.

The total number of Pokemon caught throughout Chicago from June 5-7 was reportedly 107,793,707. I contributed about 8,000 Pokemon to that total and walked 62 miles during the event.

To get to Chicago, I took the Amtrak Pennsylvanian from Altoona to Pittsburgh and originally intended to board the connecting Amtrak Floridian from Pittsburgh to Chicago. However, that train was delayed several times.

Thousands of trainers battle Mega Mewtwo X and Y at Butler Field, their assigned location in Grant Park, during the morning Pokemon Go Fest: Chicago park session Friday, June 5. At the same time, thousands of other trainers were at either Hutchinson Fields or the Clarence F. Buckingham Memorial Fountain for their Mega Mewtwo raids. Each trainer could only battle one Mega Mewtwo X and one Mega Mewtwo Y. Mirror photo by Matt Churella

By about 1 a.m. Thursday, June 4, I ended up booking a last-minute, early-morning flight out of the Pittsburgh International Airport to ensure I made it to my destination on time. The train was rescheduled to arrive in Chicago by late afternoon Thursday, and by that point, I would have missed more than half a day of Go Fest spawns and a planned meetup with my friends before our park experience Friday morning.

Ticket-holding trainers received timed research Thursday, which required exploring at least two of four city districts to earn in-game medals and an encounter with either Mega Mewtwo X or Y.

There were several Pokemon-themed attractions for trainers to visit throughout the weekend, including a Pokemon Center pop-up shop at Newcity — an outdoor shopping, dining and entertainment district in Chicago’s

Lincoln Park neighborhood — and the Pokemon Fossil Museum, a one-of-a-kind experience combining the worlds of Pokemon and paleontology at the Field Museum of Natural History through April 2027.

In Pokemon Go, trainers who visit the museum can encounter excavator Pikachu in exclusive raids and special research. During Go Fest weekend, however, the raids were temporarily shut down in coordination with local authorities due to severe overcrowding and overlapping events in the area.

A neon sign was on display for Pokemon Go Fest: Chicago at the Pokemon Center's limited-time boutique shopping experience at Newcity, an outdoor shopping, dining and entertainment district in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood. Mirror photo by Matt Churella

Ticket-holding trainers were awarded about six or seven encounters with excavator Pikachu each day of Go Fest through timed research, from which I got a shiny encounter.

Although I traveled to Chicago to play Pokemon Go, the most memorable part about my trip was getting to have breakfast with my friend Alexa, who’s a content creator known professionally as AyyyLexa, and spending time with her friends from Oregon throughout the weekend.

The most heartwarming experience was getting to witness so many people approach my friend and express gratitude for her work. When you’re out and about in the heat all day, it can become exhausting after a while. But to see the pure joy on her face every time someone would come up and ask for a picture or to say something kind is something that will stick with me forever.

Outsiders might view Pokemon Go as only a game, but I’d argue the game goes way deeper than simply catching Pokemon. It’s truly about community and bringing people together, and I feel so grateful for the friendships I’ve established through Pokemon Go.

My returning train to Pittsburgh was supposed to leave about 6:45 p.m. Sunday, but it got delayed until 9 p.m. and again later until midnight Monday, making it impossible for me to catch the connecting train back from Pittsburgh to Altoona.

The backside of Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History is shown with banners promoting the Pokemon Fossil Museum exhibit, which runs until April 2027. In Pokemon Go, trainers who visit the museum can encounter Excavator Pikachu (an event costume Pokemon shown on the far-right banner) in exclusive raids and special research. Mirror photo by Matt Churella

Grant and Alex, my New Jersey friends who stream Pokemon Go on Twitch, offered to give me a ride back to Altoona if needed, but I ended up taking the train to Pittsburgh and waiting for my brother, who drove there after he got off work to pick me up.

When the first delay notification came through on my phone, Alexa told me it was simply the universe’s way of saying I was meant to stay in Chicago for longer than I had planned. It turned out she might have been right, because not long after she said that, I ended up encountering a shiny Mewtwo with the Chicago location card background that had stats of 11 attack, 15 defense and 15 HP.

When the silver bottle cap — an item that allows trainers to increase a single stat of a Pokemon’s IVs through a hyper training method — returns, I will have a shundo Chicago location card Mewtwo, which is arguably the rarest Pokemon a trainer could walk away with from Go Fest: Chicago.

Chicago was such a beautiful city, and I hope Go Fest returns there next year because I want to go back, only next time I’m going to listen to Cambria County Commissioner Tom Chernisky’s advice and fly there directly from the John Murtha Johnstown-Cambria County Airport.

Mirror Staff Writer Matt Churella is at 814-946-7520 and mchurella@altoonamirror.com