AMG owners purchase jetboat tour company
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TweetSean Gaffney and Eli Fierer, co-owners of Chilkat Guides and Alaska Mountain Guides (AMG), took control of another major local tour operator this spring.
The pair purchased Chilkat River Adventures, the jetboat tour company owned by Karen and Don “Duck” Hess.
Karen Hess said the company’s name and programming would stay the same. Gaffney could not be reached for comment. Fierer directed the CVN to Gaffney.
River Adventures has been a mainstay of the local tourism industry for decades, offering excursions to cruise passengers who disembark either in Haines or Skagway. Hess said the “timing was right” to sell the company but declined to elaborate further on reasons for the sale.
“It’s certainly nice that they’re going to maintain local management,” said Haines Borough Tourism Director Steven Auch.
There are 24 permitted commercial tour operators in the Haines Borough. River Adventures is the only one that offers jetboat tours. Alaska Mountain Guides, along with its sister companies, is the largest.
River Adventures ran limited operations the past two years due to the pandemic. The company didn’t run tours in 2020, when no cruise ships came to Haines. And it only operated for six weeks in 2021. Tourism was the local industry most impacted by travel restrictions.
The borough has forecast a historic number of passengers would come through town this summer as ships return. If all ships came full, the town would see close to 90,000 visitors.
Auch said the borough estimates cruise ships so far are running at about 85 or 90 percent capacity due to covid precautions.
“Everything has been going along smooth,” Hess said.
She said she and her husband are not retiring and will continue to manage tours for a separate business, the Kroschel Wildlife Center.
