"Experience the Beauty of the Mississippi River aboard the Minneapolis Queen!"

When I was a kid at Quincy IL there was the Mississippi Queen, a riverboat that gave rides around the river area. It was just metal folding chairs on an open deck of a big old paddle-wheel boat--but the whole point of it was just to sit and enjoy the view. It was great!  The paddle-wheel boat was first just a no frills cargo ship for the river, or they were floating hotels to get people up and down America from New Orleans to Minneapolis...

Minneapolis has a riverboat ride, the Minneapolis Queen, but it's all waaay fancy... it's for fancy events. Maybe just for the "Public Cruise" you just stand outside at the railing. I don't know. I would never do it. Looks too fancy for me and I can see the city's river sites from the middle of the river from one of the many city bridges (one old stone railroad bridge is now just a pedestrian-only bridge).   

This link takes you to their website page that has a cute slideshow. It has one too many pics of the boat's dinning room. Who wants to look down at a plate and eat at a time like that? LOL. I suppose that's mostly just for the weddings they can host...  

http://twincitiescruises.reachlocal.net/tour-our-fleet/minneapolis-queen