Besides the local officials and dignitaries helping welcome Harbor Town Cruises to Hertford last week were three students at Perquimans County High School.
Sophomores Anniston Sawyer and Taylor Phelps and junior Crishya Sellers represented their school at a ribbon cutting ceremony for The Penelope on Friday, April 19, and took the vessel’s inaugural ride from the Hertford municipal docks.
“Judge (Janice) Cole, told me about this opportunity,” said Sellers, referring to Hertford Town Manager Janice Cole. “This was one-of-a-kind. I’ve never been able to do something this important: a first-time Harbor Towns boat ride. She (Cole) wanted us three to do this and we’re glad we came.”
Sawyer said she and Phelps and Sellers are members of the Perquimans Ambassadors at their school, a program that encourages high school students to pursue a career in teaching. She said she had been on a boat a few times, usually her great-grandfather’s fishing boat.
“This was a good opportunity to see the land from the river,” Sawyer said.
The three students are among one of the critical audiences Hertford officials hope the Harbor Towns Cruise vessels will attract: the next generation of town residents.
Hertford officials want local young people — just like out-of-town visitors — to see what makes Hertford an appealing place to live and work, and they believe the Harbor Town Cruises can help do that. Rides aboard Harbor Towns’ 45-foot specially designed passenger vessels can provide views of Hertford that you can’t get from just walking, biking or riding in a vehicle.
“There is the old S-Bridge we passed by on the boat today that is being transformed into a public space where we can hold events,” Mayor Ashley Hodges said at the ribbon cutting ceremony after the boat ride on the Perquimans River. “We have new events and classic events, the historic district, art and history museums, and new businesses for a community on the rise.”
The boat rides on the river — one of Harbor Towns Cruises’ planned tours is an 85-minute tour on the Perquimans River; another involves six-hour rides from nearby Albemarle Plantation to Columbia and to Manteo and back — also will introduce visitors to new business ventures like the Perquimans County Marine Industrial Park off Harvey Point Road.
“Visitors to Hertford will see that combination of the heritage we have in this community and these new ventures, just steps from our waterfront,” Hodges said. “From a river that’s old as time we have a new marine industrial park and riders on the boat will see that and it will bring jobs.”
Among those joining Hodges at the ceremonial ribbon cutting at the town’s municipal docks were Cole, Hertford’s town manager; state Rep. Ed Goodwin, R-N.C.; and Nicholas Didow, a business professor at the University North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Harbor Towns board chairman. Goodwin secured the $2 million initial state appropriation that funded construction of both The Penelope and Harbor Towns’ second vessel, The Moses Grandy.
Harbor Towns held ribbon-cutting celebrations in four of its other destination towns: Plymouth and Elizabeth City last week, and Columbia and Edenton this week. Harbor Towns’ regular passenger service is scheduled to begin May 17.
Most Popular
Comments / 0