Bateaux-Mouches

If you take a close look at this photo you will see that the name of the boat company is Bateaux-Mouche. When I was a teenager I knew of this name and I was told (and I believed it) that the name boats-fly came about because some of the boats have glass-covered decks and the bird's eye view could look like a the fly's eye. I haven't heard this explanation since then.

It is generally felt that the name comes from marshy areas near Lyon which were called "mouches" and attracted flies, and also happens to be where the boats were first built. Mouche is also a slang word for spy. Could these boats be spy boats? However my money is on the explanation that the company was founded by Jean-Sébastien Mouche.

Happy snapping