Chicago vs. Atlanta?

If by "outdoor activities" you mean stuff like hiking, rock climbing, etc., Chicago's not the place for that. We're a big urban city with millions of people, not a wilderness town. The only hiking we have is hiking up the stairs to the street from the subway and the only "rock climbing" is on a couple of articifial walls at a couple of health clubs. If you want real outdoor activities, you're going to probaby have to drive a couple of hours outside the city. Our outdoor activities include sitting in a sidewalk cafe eating people watching, going to a street fair or the Taste of Chicago, hanging out on a friend's back porch or balcony drinking beer or riding your bike along the lakefront. You can fish here in a few of the lagoons and you can take a canoe ride on one of the branches of the Chicago river, but that's about as outdoors as we get. But it's still a great city and sure beats the heck out of Atlanta.