While Chicago has Lincoln Park, Detroit has Belle Isle Park with plenty to see and do. I came to see the Great Lakes Museum which I reviewed but I did get to walk around a bit as well and saw good views of downtown. There is a vehicle passport fee, something I wish Illinois would do with their parks, and that fee covers any other state park for the day. It can get crowded on nice sunny days so plan accordingly.

If you want to enjoy the Detroit downtown skyline, the sunset point of this park may be one of the best options. I was there with the very specific purpose - photography of Detroit downtown at night. So, I arrived at the park after 7:30 pm. The good thing is that I didn't have to pay the admission fee but I couldn't see anything else in this park.

Beautiful place that is getting better by them fixings things Priced right Limited hours

Overall a bit of a quick, lackluster experience but perhaps that is because this time of year is still early for full effect. Admission fee is fair. A lot of run down and dilapidated buildings kind of ruin the overall atmosphere. Not crowded at all right now. Staff were friendly. This seems best for summer months. Aquarium was very cool. Much of the conservatory was closed off.

It's a very strange place. Picnic spots with tables: everywhere, loads of large areas, one huge covered area with rables WITH private bathrooms for people who *rent* the area for a private event, and one area that's all grass, with one teeeny tiny itty bitty roofed area over a concrete floor, that has ONE picnic table, ONE very huge grill. What you must know before you go: there are not enough bathrooms for the hundreds of people in the park. They claimed that some of the closed decrepit broken down buildings marked as restrooms were going to reopen for the season: but we've been there before and never seen the hulks of old bathrooms open in summer. But the most frustrating and stressful thing is that the outer road is a circle and is ONE WAY. So you're hunting for bathrooms and can't find any while knowing if you pass one up, you'll have to drive that 15-20 minute one-way drive all over. There are NO SIGNS telling you to turn left (everything is one way) or right to get to this or that, NO SIGNS saying restrooms ahead on left. Just loads and loads of picnic areas with grills, some of them for large crowds- but NO BATHROOMS! We did the loop many many times. We stopped at the gate and asked about restrooms and commented that the official map is very very small with font size less than 1, probably 0.33 font, and is so crowded with numbers and symbols, and when you think you figured it out after pulling into a parking space several times to study it again, it turns you you didn't know where you were and PASSED that place you were looking for again and have to go around the whole thing again. Nothing , not a single thing, is marked by roadside signs telling you where this and that is or that it's coming up nearby. You never know where you are on that map: the map doesn't reflect what you experience driving around. So we never found any of the restrooms the staff at the gate told us about. NOTHING LIKE THAT ANYWHERE. Then suddenly we saw what looked like a real rest room buildling. NO SIGN - there are again, no signs telling you where things are. But it looked like such a thing. Walked over under the overhang where the doors are, NOPE: closed temporarily just like I remember they were every time I've been there. But joy oh joy! They had 2 porta-potties down the way near the parking lot! The stench eminating from those two hit us from 60 feet away. I opened one up anyway and was glad I had not eaten a lunch already. It wasn't just full to the top of the porta potty, it was 3-4 inches of sludge high on the floor of it, too. I ran from that place and we got back on the one-way road to hunt down a restroom. We started driving the circle again. This time I don't know where on the map, but we saw a full parking lot and a building, and figured it might be something. Couldn't tell where we were from the twisty one-way roads and NO SIGN on the road saying, THIS IS WHAT IS TO YOUR LEFT! So we pulled in to the lot and found the name: Nature Center. Went to the desk and asked if they knew where restrooms are and mentioned that we'd been driving around and around, as the person at the gate said the ONLY bathrooms were the ones she told us about, which we never found. Turns out, this is something everyone should know, the ONLY bathrooms in the entire open state park are the two-stall bathrooms inside that nature center. The arboretum had a sign on their door: NOTICE: NO BATHROOMS HERE! Go to ....(something not on map and no name that the woman at the entrance of the park had mentioned). I suggest if you come, be prepared to be frustrated and don't drink anything. NOTHING. Unless you can find private weeds, or the line at the only bathrooms, at the Nature Center is not long. OTher than that, we didn't find much to see or do, but then it is just April. It'll be even more packed than it is already when things warm up, and the empty 20 or so picnic areas will be full, it will still be impossible to find anything since there are no signs directing one to this or that, and it's suggested you bring a porta potty in your van unless you want to go out into Detroit and find a public restroom. We spent a few hours there, all of it in the car but for 5 minutes in the Nature Center at the restroom. That's it. Frustration, anger. I just want to know why this is a state park. Most city parks are better managed than this. It's horrid.