Book Report: Old Trails and Duck Tales

Book coverThis book is a small booklet that recaps the tour of the Original Wisconsin Ducks in the Wisconsin Dells. I recently took this tour, so I know.

I was a little torn as to whether to count this as a book read or to write a book report on it, but I’ve done so for similar booklets offered by tourist attractions I’ve not visited (such as Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello), so I figured why not?

So the trails and tales are the same that you ride on if you tour with this particular flock of ducks (in Wisconsin Dells, there are many, many companies running tours with the Ducks, apparently). The tour talks a little about the Dells, about the history of the area (which includes a lost town of Newport), about the benefactor who donated land for the Wisconsin Ducks to tour on and the home her heirs still share, and about the flooding in 2008 that almost altered the artificial topography of Lake Delton and the Wisconsin River forever until a massive effort of man returned it to its “natural” original artificial existence.

The booklet is very lightweight and doesn’t delve much into the region or any of the historical anecdotes it covers, but it does serve its purpose of refreshing a visitor on the things he or she has seen. It might be a little fresher or novel for someone who hasn’t taken the tour; reading it without the experience of the ride and the guide’s patter as she recounted the stories from the book in order might make the book seem a little deeper (although the paragraphs in the book are slightly more detailed than the audio presentation, but not much) might give one more urge to learn more about the things herein. Or maybe not.

At any rate, it’s worth the quarter I’d pay for it in a book sale, and because I took the trip, it’s worth the fiver I paid for it on the duck.

Books mentioned in this review:

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