I was only in Dallas for one full day so I decided to book onto a JFK tour first before visiting the museum. There’s two tours available; one is without the museum and one is with the museum. The only difference is that the tour company charge an additional $4 to basically purchase the ticket for you! One tour is $45 and the other is $65 and they are both exactly the same except that the $65 includes the $16 admission ticket – a bit of a con.
Nevertheless the tour was very interesting and our tour guide, Mr Evans (I forgot to ask for his first name and he mentioned his last name because he’s part German, part Welsh), knew his JFK and Lee Harvey Oswald knowledge really well. In fact he’d studied all about it over the course of 30 years as well as the conspiracy theories surrounding the investigation. I never realised how many conspiracy theories there were, in fact I always thought it was very cut and dry; he was shot by Oswald from the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository building. It was not that simple.
Our tour started at the JFK Memorial Plaza where our guide told us a little about Kennedy’s presidency and the policies he had put in place. From the Memorial, we walked to Dealey Plaza to get a clear view of the Depository Building. The city have kept the plaza pretty much the same as it looked then and the museum ensure that the building itself looks like it did that day right down to the open corner window on the 6th floor where Oswald shot Kennedy from. As Mr. Evens told us about some of the events which unfolded that day, he drove us to various points around Dallas where it happened. These sights included where Oswald was living, where he shot the copper, where he ran and was eventually arrested as well as the building he was killed in. We even got to see his old house where the photo of him holding the riffle was taken. Mr. Evans was so passionate about the tour which made it all the more interesting.
After the 2 hour tour, he dropped us off at the museum. I just bought my own ticket to save the extra $4 and it’s definitely worth a visit. It’s excellent, although you can’t take photos, and it pretty much goes into more details and expands on the info we received on our tour. The tour was fantastic as I wouldn’t have seen all the extra points of interest without it. This is one of the best tours/museums I’ve done which has been based on one specific event in history and I 100% recommend it if you’re visiting Dallas!