well you are visiting st. Augustine and
one of the things you have to do is
experience it by boat right now I'm
gonna meet up with the whole crew of the
Florida water tours come with me
[Music]
right now I'm with Jessica one of the
owners of the boat so let's just start
from the beginning how did you get
started in this business so my husband
and I started Florida water tours on the
Osprey about three years ago I've always
been very passionate in marine wildlife
I have a background and I studied marine
biology and college and we came down
here to st. Augustine this is really the
perfect town to do this in and I just
love sharing this passion with people
and I totally get that just by hanging
out with you you really are passion
about what you do so passionate about
even the boat you actually got married
here I did yes yeah this boat is really
perfect for events we do weddings we do
holiday parties birthday parties
anniversaries you name it and then of
course our public tours that we do every
day and then let's talk about some of
those tours because really when you come
out to st. Augustine one of the best
ways to experience it is from the water
so what are some things people can't
expect so aside from seeing this
beautiful city and learning about it
we have dolphin and wildlife adventures
during the day suitable for all ages we
have sunset cruises in the evening that
are great for its 21 and older we have a
bar on board now
so you can just sit back relax have a
beer and listen to our entertaining crew
talk about the town and everything that
you're seeing out here on the water hope
you also have wine tasting cruises that
are something something new and it's
something different so if you're a local
there's not any other tours like this
here in st. Augustine and then of course
the nights of lights during the holiday
season absolutely and one of the things
that's really neat if you want to
charter the boat contact you because
maybe you have an event that this is the
perfect venue for yes yes it is like I
said we do weddings holiday parties we
have done anniversaries birthday parties
bachelorette parties are very popular of
course with our bar that we have now too
so yeah and one of the other things that
I think is truly unique is that you guys
have an educational component and
obviously you're passionate about it you
have a background in but part of the
idea is to share it with people out
there and right now I'm gonna meet up
with Marcel to give an overview about
that program
[Music]
Marcelle so one of the truly unique
things that you guys have the offers
that educational component especially
when it comes to kids can give it over
you about that yeah so Jess and Mike
they hired me on about a year ago to
kind of beef up some of the educational
programs that they do here so they hired
me crew the boat but one of the other
things I do is I've set up kind of an
educational outreach program so we get
school groups out on this boat which is
primarily funded by our regular other
tourists that we do that just mentioned
prior part of the proceeds go to get
kids out on this boat
sometimes free sometimes that a severely
discounted rates so no one to get out
usually they're kind of catered towards
more science-based lesson but we can do
history we do all sorts of stuff one of
the big hits that we did was a kind of a
bird scavenger hunt where we took kids
out we broke them into little teams and
they had to find as many different bird
species as possible that's just one of
the examples that we've got going on
it's really neat because if you think
about it kids now are out of the
classrooms and they're seeing what's out
their doors and that's really important
to do now what about dolphins
you see pods of dolphins all over the
place I would think that'd be a really
magical experience for kids yeah
dolphins are the showstopper for sure we
get the the who's in haast for them but
yeah this is one of the greatest places
I've ever been and I've worked a lot of
other states a lot of other areas doing
wildlife tours consistently we see
dolphins here so those school groups are
uh it goes the same with that so when we
do find dolphins we kind of let the kids
find them themselves
for starters and then we give them a
little bit of information about them for
sure and make it educational but we kind
of let them think about on their own
what they think the Dolphins are doing
out here in the wild you know not in
captivity and that's I was gonna ask you
to you at the end of the tour what's the
impact that you guys have the impression
you leave with the kids after this type
of experience well hopefully it's it's
more than just a sunburn and we actually
get to you know instill a little bit of
compassion as far as conservation
efforts are concerned here it's really
hard to be passion about something when
you just look at it in a book so when
they get out here and they see it
firsthand
you know dolphins six feet off the bow
particularly dolphins even here have
names
come friends with them so to speak
hopefully their mind is going to go to
the how how can you protect and conserve
these these animals here
[Music]
so Marcel just told me how you guys
connect with nature right now I want to
learn how do people connect with you and
learn more yeah so you can go to our
website it's WWF FL water tours calm you
can find us on Facebook facebook.com
slash Florida water tours or head to our
Instagram which you'll see all of our
beautiful pictures that we post every
day FL underscore water tours well thank
you thank you so much