Put your hands up for Detroit

Detroit, the home of the American motor industry's big three companies General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, is just down the road from Chicago. We skirt Indiana to get into the state of Michigan to be here. We stop off at the great named town of Kalamazoo for a bite to eat just off it's totally dead main street district. What a great place to say you're from.
As in Chicago we stay out of town to keep costs down and this is our first encounter of a motel that has bullet proof glass to protect the receptionist. Needless to say we have a crap nights sleep with various comings and goings and loud hip-hop music pumping around the motel. There's something like 80% of the population here that is African American, I've no idea where the other 20% are.
We change motels next day and head into the deserted downtown. Some decent buildings and some money has clearly been spent but there's no-one but the odd crazy homeless guy hanging around.
We drive up towards the large buildings, that have now been let go, of a residential area in which the large Institute of Arts is housed. This is a large building that includes one of the finest murals on earth from one of the world's best, Mexican master Diego Rivera. It's huge, filling an entire room on all walls. This is the Detroit Industries mural and tells many stories from the era of the Ford Motor Company's factory and the effect on the people who lived and worked at the time, good and bad.
Even a homage to the five workers shot to death in a strike have been included. It was a very controversial mural upon release. The uptight Americans even considered the inclusion of female breasts as pornographic. But even though Henry Ford is depicted as a bit of a tyrant his son was the main backer for the Diego murals. Unlike the Rockefeller Mural in New York that was considered too controversial and not completed. A tremendous piece and a handy free personal hand held guide walks you through the different aspects of the mural and some of the meanings behind the images.
The rest of the institute has classics from some of the most famous artists who ever lived. Funnily enough this is the only place where we see white people. Where the hell are they the rest of the time? This also makes me realise the odd balance of black and white in this country. African Americans live across the country yet we've only seen one in a National Park in over 20 that we've been in. I'm not sure what this even means but I find it very odd.
We have a quick look along the couple of streets of Greek Town. Almost unmemorable if it wasn't for an incident we witnessed. An elderly couple shuffling around the back of their car to extract a zimmerframe. Unfortunately for them some random hobo had spotted this and used his opportunity to sneak in and get out the zimmer himself. Seems friendly enough, until he won't realise the stability device to the elderly woman until he gets some money first. I hate this kind of thing and you spotting this thing before it happens. It's just like when I know some tramp is going to ask me for change, I can see something in their face.
We don't have time for much else other than getting some new front tyres for the car. I figured if this is the home of the motor industry then tyre places would be everywhere, there is certainly a lot. The other reason to buy them here was that we didn't want any reason for the US customs to pull us up when we return back from Canada, which is where we're heading next.
Detroit has seen it all. From the industrial and economic highs to the job cut and crime ridden lows. Huge axes at car plants resulted in widespread unemployment that even made the backdrop of former Detroit resident Eminem's film '8 mile'. 8 mile is the road that splits the rich and poor here but I couldn't tell the difference between 8 mile road and 11 mile road or the other way. The nearby industrial town of Flint was most affected and was featured in a Michael Moore documentary. With the American car industry faltering Detroit went the same way.
But in the end Detroit was alright and I expected it to be worse than it was. I wouldn't see a need to go back but there still remains one of the car industry's biggest exhibition here and the start of the car production line and Henry Ford's brainchild. I did think that the home of cars would have better roads but than this. Without doubt the worse roads we've driven on with highways full of massive holes for long periods. Maybe this is where the cars are tested.