Segway tours come to downtown

Move over, trolley cars and walking tours. There's a new way to see historic downtown New Bern - by Segway.

The self-balancing scooters have been on the market for about seven years, but their $5,000 price tags have made them more a luxury than a staple in most budgets.

A Segway-only tour is intended to provide the best of both worlds: some snippets of New Bern's history and - largely - just the thrill of riding the two-wheeled machine.

"It's how my wife got me to go on tours with her," said Neal Davis, the owner of Tarheel Adventures and the man behind the tours.

"I didn't want to do walking tours with her; they're not my speed," Davis said. "So Lorine went looking specifically for places that offered Segway tours so I would go."

The first Segway tour Davis ever took was of the Biltmore Estate in Asheville.

"I thought, ‘Hey man, this is pretty cool,'" he said. "It's a whole different kind of experience."

Davis decided it would be a profitable experience, too.

He bought a fleet of 10 Segways and started giving tours of the Howell Woods Nature Preserve, a 10-mile trail in Johnston County, where he lives.

But Davis is a New Bern native, and he says he saw a perfect opportunity waiting for him at home.

"New Bern is perfectly situated for a tour like this," he said. "So many of the landmarks that a person wants to see are within three miles of each other. You can easily make a circle that will take you from Cedar Grove Cemetery to the waterfront."

Davis has already given a few tours downtown, but the grand opening of his Craven Street office is set for Dec. 17.

He is offering two different tours - an hour-long tour for $35 or one with more stops for $55. Both tours will start near City Hall.

The tour begins with a five-minute lesson on how to ride: Lean forward to move ahead, lean back to reverse or stop and move the handlebars from side to side to turn.

"I can tell within five minutes if a person is going to get it," he said. "It's pretty easy to tell if they'll be able to handle the ride, and if they can't, I don't take them."

He'll take as many as eight guests on a tour, though he says a group of five or six people is ideal.

"A tour of eight leaves me with one Segway for the guide - that's me - and a back-up Segway in case something happens to one of them," he said.

City officials talked about passing an ordinance regulating Segways in September, and both aldermen and Police Chief Frank Polombo had concerns about the safety of allowing them on the sidewalks.

Davis said he has taken groups along the sides of the streets and not on the sidewalks.

His Segways can go up to 12 mph, he said.

"But we won't get above two or three miles per hour, because we'll be talking as we go," he said. "People can't hear you if you are going 12 mph."

Davis and his Segways will be in New Bern's Christmas parade on Saturday.

"It's just a really cool, fun thing," he said. "It gives a lot of people a chance to try something they probably would never own for themselves."