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Today my wife and I have been married 17 years. As with 1993 when we got married, today fell on a Saturday. So, we decided to do something special.

This morning we drove into Boston, parked in the (expensive) Aquarium garage and bought tickets for a boat ride out to George’s Island.
It was a very nice and sunny day after a solid week of rain. So, there were lots of people with similar ideas.

Our boat was a two deck high speed catamaran.

There seemed to be a lot of people waiting to get on the boat.

But, it turned out most of them were getting on the boat to Salem.

This seems like a great idea to me. We had discussed going to the museum we like in Salem, but neither of us wanted to face driving into Salem in October due to the Halloween people. But, driving to Boston and taking a boat seemed like a great idea.

Despite many folks getting on the boat to Salem. There were still plenty of folk on our boat.

As we set off, a much smaller boat squeezed past ours as we backed up. I would have given the bigger boat the right of way, but they made it through.

There were some very nice ships in the harbor. This one is very nice.

The “Hooter Patrol IV” seems like a nice ship, but I really do wonder about its owner.

It also makes me wonder about #’s I through III.

Although I didn’t think much of the small boat playing chicken with us, I have to say our captain didn’t leave a lot of clearance between other ships as he left the dock.

It was a near perfect day. Warm, but not hot. Clear, but not too windy.

Of course, there were much larger ships about as well.

As we cruised out of the inner harbor, I could see Blue Hill, which is very close to where I grew up. There is an observation area on the hill that I like and faces where we were.

The south side of the harbor has the JFK library on the right, the worlds largest piece of art work under copyright in the center and Blue Hill on the left.

We made a brief stop at Spectacle Island on the way out. I’ve never gotten off there, but it looks nice.

As we continued on, we passed under the Long Island Bridge. I’ve seen it many times, but never been over it, or under it before today.

It was a fast ride out, much faster then the boats out to the island I took when I was a kid. But, it was still a nice ride and we both liked it.

Finally, George’s Island came into sight.

It’s just a little bit past the Pirate Cursed Island we went past on our last harbor cruise.

It was low tide, so more of the sinking island was visible.

We got to George’s Island with it’s fort built 190 years ago (or, started then) to protect Boston harbor.

We went into the museum and saw the orientation movie. Then, we went out to the ranger station for the ranger guided tour of the fort on the island.
The tour starts in the guard house/stockade.