People would sit in their car, play bingo. 'How it all got started is the baseball team down in the reservation needed uniforms, and they couldn't figure out how to raise the money to get the uniforms,' Harris recalls. The resort got its start in 1981, just three years after two track roads in the Hannahville Indian Community – where Island is located – were paved. Whatever your palate is, whatever your pocketbook dictates, we can accommodate that. You come here, and everything is here that you need. 'We're a full service resort,' says Island marketing director Susan Harris. There is also a convention center attached.

Inside the complex, which includes an 11-story hotel tower that affords great views of the adjacent golf course to the south and to the surrounding countryside (see below), there is everything one could need for a self-contained getaway: a spa with a pool and an adjacent fitness center, a casino with slots, bingo, poker and gaming tables, a variety of restaurants and bars, the hotel, a gift shop, the golf course and copious free parking.Īnd 18 weekends each year, national talent performing in a state of the art concert and show venue. 2 & 41 in Harris, Michigan, appears and it looks like an oasis of fun in a quiet rural area. It’s hard to believe there’s a full-service resort, hotel and casino out here, but then the Island Resort & Casino, W399 Hwys.

There are abundant trees, but not much else in this peaceful landscape dotted with the occasional home or farm. – Driving along the wooded roads of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, the area is awash in autumn color.

The island resort and casino