Observation:  Belle Isle – so much to say here, but not enough words and I feel like my pictures do not do it justice.  It’s had some rough years for sure, but such an amazing gem for the city, and what the DNR has done with it in just a few years is simply amazing.  My father passed away a number of years ago, but one of my favorite stories I ever remember him telling me was how in high school he and some buddies would go there with a canoe they had pulled together that actually had a record player built into it.  It was the 1940s and so you had to crank it, but I just envision the ladies that came-a-calling when they heard it play, and that jazz and big band sound traveling through the canals and lakes there before the days of boomboxes or car stereos.  Sure the world has changed again a lot, but if you have not been there in recent years, I do hope you will go, so you have similar stories to tell your kids in your later years of life that will seem so distant and dreamlike to them.

Distance:  14.27miles

D-Fact: Belle Isle, measuring in at 982 acres, is actually bigger than New York City’s Central Park