So long, Miss Hampton II: Popular tour boat, a fixture on the bay for 32 years, sold to Delaware company
Wednesday was a good day for sailing, said Capt. Mike Hebert, who for the past three decades navigated scenic tours upon the Miss Hampton II boat.
But for this final voyage from Hampton’s downtown waterfront, Hebert wasn’t manning the bridge. A new owner stood aboard the vessel and set a course toward the Atlantic Ocean, with Cape Henlopen in Delaware as its destination — its new home.
The owners of the Miss Hampton II, a fixture on the Chesapeake Bay for 32 years, have sold the 117-seat cruiser.
Hebert, 72, the general manager and captain said he and co-owner Jim Holt, 87, are retiring. The boat went on the market this spring and the duo received several offers, accepting from an operator from Capewater Tours in Lewes, Delaware.
“I’ve been doing this since I was 18,” Hebert said of captaining boats. “It’s kind of a shame. We’ve been having our best season, but we already had the boat advertised for sale. We had to strike while the iron was hot.”
The sale comes in the middle of a banner season with nearly full capacity every day, city officials wrote in a release. The package did tours six days a week and charters based on availability from mid-April through October — or as the fall weather allowed.
Mary Fugere, director of the Hampton Convention & Visitor Bureau said the city is on the hunt for a new vendor to cover the harbor tour market.
“We have had a few early conversations with potentially interested tour boat operators, but our goal is to have a tour boat in place by next spring,” she said in an email.
Since it was purchased in 1989, Miss Hampton II had been in continuous service, city officials said. The cruiser was noticeable to many on the shore from Buckroe Beach to Fort Monroe and the tour had become “a focal point” in highlighting Hampton’s history, Hebert said in a city release.
‘We have seen the demise of the nuclear-powered cruiser during our tours. Newer, more modern aircraft carriers, destroyers, and submarines have arrived, which required our tour guides to adapt their narrative,” Hebert said.
Other factors also may have contributed to a decision to sell.
“The COVID situation really hurt us pretty bad,” Hebert noted.
Last year before the pandemic took hold, the tour began making shifts. For years, the boat docked at historic Fort Wool, a place only accessible via boat, but that ended as the island fort was converted into a bird habitat.
Lisa Vernon Sparks, 757-247-4832, lvernonsparks@dailypress.com
