The Crown Jewel of Detroit

Being raised not only in The Burbs™ but by decidedly anti-Detroit parents, I have had a poor view of what Belle Isle is for pretty much my whole life. Words like "unsafe", "dirty" and "ghetto" have all been associated to Belle Isle by family, and honestly, in my own head. I don't think I ever thought that Belle Isle would be a place for roving gangs or anything, but I definitely never felt it was a place I'd consider bringing my babies.

Actually, this bias that has been hammered into me is one of the reasons that I have spent so much time with RODP in Detroit this year.

Anyway. So I'm sure you can imagine my surprise when I drove through Belle Isle in February for our first stint at Anna Scripps. I kept saying "wow!" and "oh my.. Wow!!" and that was just on my drive around the island on my way out. It was then that I decided that once summer hit we would be BACK.. and back we came..

So, I got to the island early - which to be honest in my life is unheard of - and while driving to Anna Scripps (our meeting place) I saw a GREAT view of Detroit, so of course I had to stop!

After then spending too much time shooting the cityscape (whoops) I headed over to the meeting place, and of course, now that I was LATE an extended family of geese decided right then was a great time to cross the street..

Ha. Of course it didn't take too long, and it was actually fun to watch. I actually only grabbed my camera because another blogger I know "sleepydog" loves this stuff, so I had to share.

I made it to Anna Scripps, and waited a while for everyone to show, and finally we all went in. Well everyone else went in, I hit the garden in front. The first photo in this entry is from the garden. As is this one:

I have to be honest.. I'm LOVING the "from underneath" shooting I've been doing lately. Love.

Anna Scripps is broken up into different rooms. The two rooms I spent the most time in is tropical and desert:

There is also a lily pond - but I did it NO justice. However, one of the gentleman who came by was Mr. Rodney Arroyo, and he took this photo. I highly recommend you take a look .

From there we went over to the Scott Fountain.

The friends of Belle Isle tell the story of the Scott Fountain. "The James Scott Memorial Fountain is at the head of Belle Isle facing the Detroit cityscape. James Scott was an eccentric gambler and controversial socialite. He bequeathed a $500,000 grant to build a fountain on Belle Isle along with a life-sized statue of himself. The fountain is constructed of Vermont White Marble and has 109 water outlets in the shape of human heads, dolphins, turtles, lionesses and animal horns. Construction was completed in 1925, 15 years after his death in 1910. Water shows are presented from Memorial Day through October 1st. "

The view of The City from the fountain.

From here we went over to the Belle Isle Casino, but honestly, I didn't shoot there. I should have, it was gorgeous. Maybe Karen will share some of hers :)

Off to the pier! I was so excited to shoot on the pier!

And finally, we headed over to the lighthouse. Seriously. Did you even KNOW there was a lighthouse on Belle Isle? The walk was long - mostly because we parked in the wrong place (whoops) but it was well worth the walk.

Finally, on the walk back, I would never have guessed that there was ANY part of the D this pretty.

I was not only surprised, but had to concede that the Friends of Belle Isle's description of Belle Isle as "The Crown Jewel of Detroit" was not only accurate, but well and goodly deserved.