Welcome everyone to the Seattle Duck Tour! The first part of the tour will be in Seattle’s historic Pioneer Square district, where the original “skid row” was termed by loggers working in area. Now, manufacturing and retail are the pillars of the region’s economy. Yes, not sexy, but solid blue collar infrastructure…

… and now we are passing by the Kingdom, which is about to be demolished. This dome used to be the home of the NFL team Seattle Seahawks before former Seattle native and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen bought the team in 1999 and moved it to his new hometown of Austin…

… this monumental stadium also used to be home of the Major League team Seattle Mariners before its move to Washington DC when the Nintendo ownership sold the team after the company decided to move its American headquarters from here to Austin, Texas…

…now, we are in the Seattle Science Center area, where the Space Needle still stands as the city’s proudest symbol from the 1962 World’s Fair. Also, you will notice the large structure there which is the Key Arena where the Seattle Sonics played up to this year. Now, the city’s last professional team is moving to Oklahoma City…

…we are now moving from land to the water part of the tour… this is Lake Union, a very industrial district with famous warehouses. Some developers had talked about developing this beautiful part of the city with condos and modern commercial buildings, but could not raise the funds for such a development. Over there, is Gas Works park…

…past the University of Washington here, is an area called Sand Point, where Microsoft founder Bill Gates grew up before starting his company in Texas. His mother, Mary Gates was a famous philanthropist in the area and his father a well-known attorney. It was rumored once that Bill Gates wanted to move his company to Seattle…

…as we conclude our tour of beautiful Seattle on this sunny, gorgeous day, let me share a few facts about the Emerald City. We have a population of about 1 million in the entire Puget Sound region with Boeing being the largest employer by far with about 65,000 workers here. Like many of our sports teams, the company “moved” its headquarters elsewhere in 2001, and there is some concern about the company’s commitment to keeping jobs here. For years, the local leaders have tried to lure some of the technology companies to the area from the Silicon Valley, as well as the Austin area. Not only was Microsoft once rumored to move here, but Amazon, Real Networks and a few other technology companies tried to open satellite offices here but closed them down recently due to a lack of technology-educated work force. Their failure, however, has been our gain as we have excellent traffic and one of the nation’s most affordable housing markets. We’d like to say we have the most affordable waterfront living in the country! Yes, Seattle remains one of the best kept secrets in the country…

,,,Thank you sir and ma’am for being on our tour today. As our only customers today, we can offer these special coupons for you to eat at Ivar’s…