Guiding principles in place
As tourism grows, more guides needed to lead the way
What began as a favour to a friend has turned into viable career and business for tour company leader Peter Steele who sees no reason why the same can’t happen for someone else.
“It’s something I got into to help a friend out that was desperate to have somebody do a tour for them,” he said. “I was asked on a Sunday, the cruise ship was in on Wednesday and on Tuesday I went out on a bus to see what they did and I haven’t looked back since.”
Steele, who’s also well known as an artist, has been involved in the tourism industry for 29 years.
In addition to running his own touring company, Peter Steele Tours, he also does training sessions across the Maritimes for those thinking about entering the guiding business.
“Oddly enough, just about everyone who guides on this island, pretty well has taken a workshop of mine,” said Steele. “The port itself, if you’re doing anything relating to taking anyone off a ship out around this island anywhere, they want you to be taking my workshop first. They don’t want you near that dock until you have.”
Steele conducted one of his half-day workshops on Saturday at the Joan Harriss Cruise Pavilion, geared towards those who might want to lead tours during cruise ship season.
Steele said guides are needed in the area because of the growth of the cruise ship industry in Cape Breton’s tourism economy.
“The industry is growing,” he said just before his course began. “It’s getting busier — this year, we’re up 67 per cent in traffic. This year, we’re expecting just our cruise ships in Sydney to bring (in) $22 million. That’s a lot of money coming into the economy but oddly enough that comes in over a period of 61 days. Although we’ve got 89 ships, there’s only 61 days that they come in.
“There are not many industries around that over a course of 61 days can bring in $22 million to the economy.”
A guide can typically expect about $65 to conduct a fourhour tour for a major land excursion company. Saturday’s course covered such basics as the role and responsibility of a tour guide, compulsory information that guides need to know and policies and procedures that must be followed.
“It’s not just standing in front of somebody and telling them this and that,” said Steele. “There’s a lot of policies and procedures you have to follow — every venue you go to has a different policy and procedure that you have to follow so what I do is give them all the ground work — if you have a trade that you want to do, you go to college and study that trade. Because of the quality that you have to give today, people really need that training before they get started.”
William Palander moved to Cape Breton in 2004 when he visited the island on a two-week holiday and liked it so much he never left. Now that he’s recently retired from the travel industry, he attended the course in the hope of turning his love for Cape Breton into a part-time job.
“It’s something that I would like to do,” Palander said. “I love the island and I certainly would love to be able to introduce others to the island as they pass through Cape Breton.”