New Walking Tour Opens in St. John's

Visitors to St. John’s this summer will have a new way to explore the city with St. John’s Walking Tours. They launched earlier this month with two tour options for travellers and locals alike.

You can stroll some of the oldest streets in North America with a local guide and be entertained by quirky stories. You’ll see some of the city’s best hidden gems and you might even learn something about the place that even the locals don’t know.

Walking tours are popular in cities across Europe, the US, and mainland Canada, but options were limited in Newfoundland and Labrador. Owner Pierre Trowbridge wanted to change that.

Originally from the province, he had been teaching English in China for several years when COVID happened. He’d been on his regular winter vacation outside of the country when borders closed and he was faced with riding it out where he was in Cambodia or being evacuated back home to Canada. He arrived home with just two changes of clothes, a camera, and a bicycle while the rest of his belongings have since been packed up by his former co-workers. Still unable to return to the country more than two years later, it was time to look forward and try something new.

And you can expect something new with St. John’s Walking Tours. While you’ll get a dose of history you’ll get a sense of the modern day city as well.

“Right from the beginning we didn’t want this to be a purely historical tour. It’s impossible to do a tour of downtown St. John’s without having history involved because it’s just pouring out of every building and every street down here. We have such a remarkable and colourful history. But we also bring in some pop culture references and things like that. For instance, we tell the story of Mary Brown’s and the fact that Mary Brown was a real person.” Trowbridge says.

The best things about these tours is that locals can get just as much out of it as visitors. It’s the perfect group activity to plan for your friends and family visiting this summer.