Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Quack...

So yesterday I took the day off from work and went into Boston with my family. My wife's aunt and cousins are visiting from CA, so she took the week off and along with her mom planned some activities, and yesterday's activity was going into Boston and going on one of the Duck Tours. Basically, it's a group that has a bunch of restored WWII DUKW amphibious vehicles that they use to give tours of Boston from both land and sea.

The land tour is pretty routine - you see all of the Boston landmarks, from the Bunker Hill Monument to the Old North Church to the Bull & Finch pub. Our "ConDUCKtour" was exemplary - he really put a lot of himself into the tour, and made it just that much better. He combined history, humor, and road rage all in one concise tour, keeping us informed, entertained, and even slightly nervous - those DUKWs are big vehicles and Boston streets are not, as a rule, meant for amphibious military craft...

The water tour was much shorter than the land tour, but still a lot of fun. Here's what a DUKW looks like under sail:

Hubcaps Aweigh!

Yes, that's the South Bay House of Corrections in the background... That's obviously not our DUKW - ours was blue - but they're all the same in the water, really. It handled pretty much like you'd expect a sea-going 6½ ton GMC cab-over to handle in the water, but given that we only spent about 20 minutes at sea, it wasn't too bad...

Here were the two highlights of the entire tour:

Cap'n TheBoy

Privateer BabyGirl G.

When they get the boat out on the water, the driver opens up the helm (driver's seat) to any and all who would like to take a turn steering a DUKW. There was enough time on our voyage for all of the kids to have a turn at the tiller, and as you can see from the look on TheBoy and BabyGirl G.'s faces, they had a blast.

Actually, we all had a blast - all anyone could talk about the rest of the day is how much fun we had on the tour. Neither I nor my wife had ever been before (nor either child), so this was a true G. family first, and one I'd be happy to repeat. I wish we'd had more time on the water - it would have been great to get some pictures of Old Ironsides from the water - but the tour's only 80 minutes long.

The Boston Duck Tour is money well-spent IMHO, and that's glowing praise from a cheap SOB like me...

That is all.

5 comments:

Butch Cassidy said...

It needs a a Ma Deuce, but I'm just being picky. The kiddies could then take turns on the fifty.
You do make it sound fun, I may have to drag the wife and kids aboard the next time we end up in bowaston.

Paladin said...

Sounds like something I'd enjoy. I just realized that the last time I was in Boston was with my folks back in 1976, for the Bicentenial.

Think they'll let me back in if I promise not to stay? :)

Ancient Woodsman said...

They put an Allison automatic in those things? Looks like the controls have all been modernized. Neat! Thanks for sharing.

Jim said...

We've got a two-duck fleet here in Galvetraz. The waterborne part runs in Offat's Bayou, but the road trip pretty well covers the island.

They get rave review for the narration here, too.

And yes, they do need a .50


Jim
Sunk New Dawn
Galveston, TX

agg79 said...

Been on several Duck tours (Branson, Galveston, Seattle). Same corny jokes, campy one liners, gawdy souvineers. Still a pretty good deal to see a town. Especially for those out of town guests you want to impress (or irritate). I love the old DUKWs. Nice to see something from WWII still in service (although I still have doubts about taking that much Army steel out in the open water).