There’s a new business in town that’s hoping to make the age-old tradition of floating the Okanagan River Channel easier.
Owner and operator Nicholas Kruger is launching Float Penticton this Friday. After announcing it on social media last week, he said the response from the community has been positive.
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“I just wanted to take away all the stress of floating the river and make it easier for people,” he said.
Float Penticton offers a shuttle service that starts at the customers doorstep, dropping people off at the river and then picking them up after and dropping them at their house, hotel or Airbnb, he said. The shuttle offers door-to-door service with pre-scheduled pick up times so there is no wait and no need to find parking at the north end of the Okanagan River Channel.
It will run Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Cost is $15 per person.
The goal is to make the Okanagan River Channel more of a “Penticton experience and not just a river experience. I want the experience to start at people’s doorstep,” he said.
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“We’re going to start it out slowly and listen to what people think about it and adjust it as we go along to make sure we are doing the best that we can.”
Kruger said he came up with the idea while in Mexico last year where he said all the services and tourist activities involved picking people up right at their hotels.
“They pick you up at the doorstep, you don’t have to worry about anything,” he said. “I just thought that their custom service there was great. I was able to plan out whole days in Mexico before I even got there. That, to me, was exciting.”
