Duck!

Yesterday I went on a London Duck tour. These are the ex-D-day landing craft that anyone who has been in central London for more than 5 minutes will have seen cruising around. Some people think I'm crazy to so avidly do the tourist stuff in the city where I live but most of it is brilliant and this was no exception (although it won't stop me muttering, "bloody tourists" under my breath, especially on the tube). As an added bonus, this one was a James Bond themed tour.

If you have read any of my other posts, you will know I am a huge Bond fan. Because of this, I was a little concerned the tour would be nothing more than shuttling round a few of the more obvious film locations that one can see simply by taking a trip on the eye. This feeling wasn't helped when the guide turned up in a dinner suit with a red clip-on velvet bow tie looking rather like a 1970s game show host. How wrong I was. The guy was obviously a passionate Bond fan and knew the subject inside out. Not only that, but there was a perfect blend of film Bond, book Bond, Flemming biography, World War Two history and the history of espionage. It gave a wonderful insight into where Bond came from and illustrated that, though some of the plots were a bit outlandish, some of the schemes (that worked) during WWII were no less so. As an added bonus, the guy doing the tour knew how to use a microphone so spoke into it from a decent distance and didn't shout into it while deepthroating it; many brownie points for that.

In truth the river-based bit of the tour was unnecessary and the top speed of the boat (6 knots or old lady doing widths of the pool speed) meant we didn't see too much from the river. However as someone who loves being in or on water, any opportunity to float about was fun in itself and there is a certain novelty value to seeing the Palace of Westminster from the water.

The fact that the Ducks are still running amazes me and impresses me. Being on one during a landing must have been terrifying beyond belief. They are far from salubrious however the concept is brilliant. Apparently they were built to last six weeks with engines to last three days (who knew the army outsourced the building of them to Kia!) so the fact they are still running and running well is phenomenal.