Cary opens its completed Downtown Park in time for the holiday season

More than three years ago, I visited downtown Cary, N.C., and photographed what I thought was mostly completed work on a Downtown Park. 

The dominant attraction of the park was a striking fountain, and I spent considerable time looking for various angles to capture the fountain's beauty. There was construction activity to the east of the fountain, but the information I had was that it was going to be a new library and parking garage, technically not part of the park. But ... they are park-adjacent!  

I didn't know until a few months ago that Cary has been working all this time to expand the park to approximately three times the size that I first saw in September 2018. And then two weeks ago, the town officially opened the fully completed project to the public, just in time for installation of lots of holiday lights and decorations, which made the park worth visiting both day and night, the latter at least through the holidays.

Curious, I returned to Cary on Monday, Dec. 4 during daylight hours to photograph the park. I've never seen anything like it -- at least not for a downtown park. Not anywhere, and not at any time. If I dare say it, at the risk of being hyperbolic, it's almost other worldly.

There are ponds, streams with layered spills, a lagoon, multiple levels (giving visitors different perspectives), hills, stairways, several on-site buildings, a corner in which dogs are invited to play and a nice-sized open lawn in front of what appears to be a covered performance stage. The photo leading off the post is that apparent stage, with a sliver of the open lawn on the left side of the image. The photo below shows the lawn in its entirety as seen from the stage. 

There's also a good amount of playground equipment (see photo below; not an optimum shot, but there were kids on the equipment, and I didn't want to get minors into the photo if I could possibly avoid it) and several overlooks, including one walkway whose end point is surrounded by a cluster of metal circles and artistically splayed spikes -- far enough away from visitors to not cause any harm. There also are foosball tables and a rectangular skating rink, and everything in the park is accessible by wide, snaking concrete walkways (and/or the aforementioned stairways).

I know I packed a lot into the two previous paragraphs, so suffice to say that it's one of those things you'll have to visit and see yourself to believe. I just hope the pictures in this post do it justice.  

The park's south end is anchored now by the fountain -- it is still there -- and by a newly constructed Cary Public Library and, behind the library, a multi-floor parking garage.

To view a full gallery of images from my Dec. 4 shoot at the completed Downtown Cary Park, follow the link in this sentence.  

Above: The cluster of metal circles and artistically splayed spikes near the end of a bridge overlook. 

Above: This pond is immediately behind the covered stage; New apartments or townhouses are in the background on the parks southeast end.

Above: One of the layered stream spills. I think the water from here flows into the pond in the picture immediately above it. 

Above: The far end of the pond, where one can see another stream spill (foreground left) as well as three levels of a pedestrian bridge that eventually takes a visitor to the overlook with the splayed metal spikes.  

Above and below: Opposite sides of enclosures on the park's northwest segment. Not sure what these buildings are for. 

Above and next two below are views from the spiky metal overview. Above is the pond, performance stage and open lawn in the background. Below, a portion of Barkyland, where dogs are invited to play and romp. The second photo below is a tree that grabbed my attention while at the overlook. 

The skating rink (above) and Foosball tables (below), both near the park's northeast end. 

Above: A green area behind the main fountain at the park's southwest end; the Cary Arts Center is the building in the background. 

Above and below: A side and straight on view of the new library just south of the park. The adjacent and new parking garage is in the second photo below. 

A closeup of the "Read" sign (above) outside the public library, and a closer shot of the fountains (below) that started the Downtown Park project. 

                             

Above and next three below: Water reflection shots taken at various points in the park. 

Above and next two below: A sampling of the park's decorations for the holiday season. 

Above and next four below: Outside the park along Academy Street, the city has other decorations for the season.