The Boston Duck Tour was the only touristy thing I was able to do while working for a week in Boston during summer 2000, but by all accounts, it's the most worthwhile way of getting a quick snapshot of this great city.
As soon as I saw my first "duck" vehicle going by on Boyleston St, I decided I had to investigate, and
found that the tours departed from the nearby Government Center. Their website is here.
These amphibious vehicles, both drive about the streets, and take you into the Charles river for a
different perspective. It was the best $22.05 I've ever spent. Our driver/captain was great, an ex-cop,
ex airforce man who called himself Officer D Dunkin (after his passion for doughnuts) with an encyclopaedic knowledge of Boston and the perfect temperament for
dealing with hordes of tourists. He had the great Boston accent I was looking for - lots of long "ahhhhrs".
He even lets you drive the vehicle, when it's on water. Half the people
on my trip were from the Berklee Music College.
Boston, in case you've been in a vacuum for the last few years, is undergoing a monster urban
renewal project, second only in the world in scale and cost to the huge Three Gorges Dam project
in China. It's called the big dig and, the promises are that in a few
years all of Boston's overpasses and elevated highways will be replaced by sleek undergound tunnels.
One thing's for sure, we got seriously lost driving around - the roads changed on just in the 3 days
while we were there, and I sense patience is wearing thin with the locals...
I would just like to ask that the kind people from Hertz at Boston airport please learn that
Delta Shuttles (what I apparently needed) depart from Terminal A while the rest of Delta goes from Terminal C - standing
in line at 5am for 30 minutes only after just 2 hours sleep only to find I'm in the wrong terminal, pre-morning coffee was just not
a pretty site.
Below is a few pics I took from the Duck.
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