Captain Doug is from the area, and was thus was full of information, and gave me the ongoing…read morenarration I was looking for, throughout the tour. He He was helpful in answering questions as well. I will say that is way colder than you can imagine on the VERY windy water, and my 3 layers of clothing were not enough to keep me warm. No matter how tough you think you are, wear at minimum 2 *heavy* layers of clothing, and a thick windbreaker (my think raincoat did not hold up) and a hat to keep your head and ears warm. It's not just that it's 10 degrees colder on the water -- it's a constant cold wind blowing at you... and that's on a day when there wasn't a strong wind on the island itself. If you're not properly dressed, you won't find it relaxing. Although this tour company does warn you about the colder weather on the boat, it does not sufficiently warn you about the constant unrelenting wind.

The entire time was visually beautiful and Captain Dan was a wealth of information…read more We would highly recommend this tour.

A delightful real life experience of the famous Chincoteague Island and ponies. Storybook boat ride…read morearound the island at 6am spoiled us with ponies right off dock. Ours tour was chock-a-block full of personal stories from our husband and wife Captain and tour guide duo extraordinaire. Our eye candy consisted of a sting ray enjoying a clam breakfast, flopping around in the shallow waters like a happy kid in the candy shop. It was topped by a crane slurping down an eel then a bald eagle. We spied a few more ponies then made our way around the other side of the island for a full grand tour. Appreciated the excellent service and comfortable boat.

The best part of our trip! The sunset tour was perfect for our ten year anniversary! The staff was…read morevery great from start to finish. Our tour guide, Aiden was awesome. He was very knowledgable about the ponies and history of the island. We got a great view of the ponies and dolphins, as well as a great tour of the island.

We had a wonderful boat ride with Randy as he gave a lot of information about the island, the…read moreponies and how the area has changed over the years. Very personable. A worthwhile tour.

Captain Randy is the best! Extremely knowledgeable of the area and provided lots of information…read moreabout all of the hidden gems. Friendly, kind, and helpful. Highly recommend!!!

Captain Jake was very personable and had great knowledge of the island. We got to see the infamous…read more"Riptide" with his mares and their foals and two bald eagles, and enjoyed some laughs along the way. A super fun and beautiful experience. Highly recommend!

Still great! This is our third year with this company and we have had great luck every time. This…read moretime, the southern herd wasn't close but we saw a band that was part of the northern herd up close! Thanks again to Captain Henry and Captain Brad and the team for a great evening.

Captain Barry's has become our family tradition with all the generations in our family. We never…read morestop learning something new with Captain Barry and we could not imagine our family vacation without this experience.

We had a fun and eye opening time experiencing the bay with Captain Barry. He is full of fun,…read moreobscure facts and knows the area like the back of his hand. We took a gorgeous route to secret spots, saw plenty of wildlife, and learned all about the local ecosystem. Fun was had by all.... Highly recommend!!

We had a phenomenal experience with Captain Hunter!…read more We went on a lovely sunset tour with two moms and two four year old girls. We booked with Hunter ahead of time on the phone. He was honest about our chances of seeing wildlife--he said early morning was better, but for our toddlers, that wasn't happening. We decided to go ahead and take our chances with the sunset cruise. There are bathrooms in the boat house near the parking lot. The ride is around 2 hours, so we made sure our girls went beforehand. You can bring your own booze and snacks, so it was an extra fun mom outing, lol! Hunter was so informative and just a nice guy all around. I had tons of questions about Chincoteague, the ponies, and even remote Tangier Island. He knew so much--he has a degree in marine biology from William and Mary and he's also a member of the local fire department. And he's really a real cowboy! Seriously!!! His specialized knowledge, regarding both local flavor as well as wildlife, was something I wouldn't have wanted to miss. By going on this tour, I got to know so much more about the place I was visiting. On to wildlife: we saw TONS of dolphins jumping right by our boat! We also saw some beautiful birds, and you best believe Hunter delivered on the ponies!! He did some really cool guy shit to get us to a shallow spot to see the ponies. We saw a small group of them and he knew every single one of them by name. Our girls were in heaven, picking out their favorites. On the ride home, the sun was setting and it was just beautiful. I hope someone else will see this review and decide to go on this special tour!

Amazing! Our tour guide knew so much and knew great areas to see horses. He got us so close to the…read morehorses. The tour started on time. I had two kids with me (5 and 1), they loved it. Such an amazing experience!

The views at sunndown were beautiful and thanks to my guide I got to see the dolphin that rose up…read morebehind my kayak. Lily R

This wasn't the greatest experience in the world, and at one point it was a comical disaster. We…read morewent on a very windy day (10-20 mph) that got windier as we were on the water. The way out against the wind and tide was tough. The way back, with wind and tide hitting us sideways, was worse. We got pushed into the marsh reeds and stuck in the mud, with each wave pouring into the canoe and soaking our butts. The water was not deep (obviously, since we were stuck), and it wasn't super-cold, but it was a little freaky to be totally unable to move against the tide and wind. By the way, I had called the company the prior day to discuss whether we could even go out in those conditions, and explained we had kayaked in the past but never in rough water or high winds. Eventually, we pushed our way out with our paddles in the muck and turned to open water. No thanks to our guide, who was 50 feet ahead, just sort of sitting there in open water. He seemed oblivious to our struggles, as well as the other person on our trip, who also had been blown into the marsh. So while I appreciated that we saw a lot of ponies in the marsh, I can't rate the experience very highly when we got such little help from our guide. Overall, he was nice, but he was a slacker. He gave us no advice on how to position ourselves in the wind and tide, and when I referred to how hard it was when we were finished, he said, Yeah, you seemed to be working it out, and the water was cold so I didn't want to have to climb in and pull you. Dude, that's what you're paid to do! Bottom line is that our guide was only ok. He told us interesting stuff about the ponies and their evolution. We talked about launches from Wallops. He knew about the grasses and snails and tides and other stuff, if we asked. And I give him credit for taking us to a 2nd area with more ponies, even though it extended his time beyond schedule. But was it a 5-star effort to make us feel confident under tough conditions? No.

We had a lovely time with Lacy and Brian. We went on a Saturday morning at 9 AM. The weather was…read moreperfect and we were able to see every band of horses! Brian and Lacy provided amazing commentary during our ride and made the tour very enjoyable. We definitely recommend this tour!

An extremely disappointing tour. We drove a total of 4 hours to come to this, only to find the good…read morereviews and website photos/description severely deceiving. Out of a 2-hour tour, we spent a total of 10 minutes looking at the horses, which were extremely far away. In the attached photos, the circled red area is where the ponies were located. The naked eye could not see them, nor could my camera equipment. It was a huge disappointment for my entire family that was looking forward to this for a Virginia vacation. The rest of the two hours were spent driving around the marsh, with some facts about the lighthouses and pony auction, but it was filled mostly in silence. Unfortunately, it was a glorified pontoon boat ride around the water, which was beautiful, but not worth the 4-hour drive and worth the cost of the tickets. Ultimately, we lost an entire day for 10 minutes with ponies we could not even see. I've been on plenty of wildlife tours (large and family-owned), and completely understand it's a matter of luck to get close to any animal. The guides at the very least try to salvage it by looking for other animals, birds, etc., or make it an informative trip. However, this absolutely felt like it was taking advantage of tourists to charge premium prices with zero effort to fulfill what was advertised. After returning from our trip, we looked at reviews and saw similarities of our own experience with the negatively rated ones. In summary, I would recommend another tour boat to see the wild ponies. Even with professional camera gear and binoculars, they were so far away that no photo (or our imaginations) could show what the ponies looked like.

What an amazing trip! My mom waited 70 years for this! We booked our trip for a Saturday 2pm and…read morethere were only 2 others on the boat. We went in with the idea that we will have a great trip on the water and learn a little about the area. Fingers crossed to see the horses, that is what mom waited all these years for! We saw part of the heard on the way out from a distance and were happy with that. Then we saw a pair of eagles and dolphins and a group of pelicans and leaned about wallops island. On the way back the heard was closer and we got the experience of a lifetime. They came closer and closer and we were in awe. Captain John was great and the rest of the staff were very friendly and the boat was very clean. We also got a special shell from a little entrepreneur!

We took an early Sunday morning boat tour around the Chincoteague Wildlife refuge with Captain…read moreJohn. Although it was cloudy and raining, John reassured us that we would have better chance of seeing wildlife in such a weather. He took us to interesting places around the island including the lighthouse, oyster beds, mariner's cross, and popular bird nesting grounds (egrets, pelicans, laughing gulls, black backed gulls, ducks). We also saw the ponies from afar. Overall, this was a great memorable exprience! P.S. only suggestion: could rain coats be provided to customers in a rainy weather?

Captain Casey is a seasoned local tour captain who just struck out on his own. With a recent model…read moreboat, a knack for a good story, and a love for the island life, Casey made our tour the highlight of our family visit to Chincoteague. While sharing entertaining anecdotes and local lore, he took us up close with ponies and dolphins, bringing us into secluded waterways to see Beach Boy's band of ponies up close at the south end of Assateague Island. A born teacher, Casey provided an informative and engaging adventure for passengers ranging in age from 6 to 60.

This was great! 100% would recommend and do again! The private tour is the way to go. A…read morebeautiful, comfortable boat and easy to access; easy to find at the harbor - just ask someone standing around Dock 1 for Captain Casey; customized-experience - we spent a lovely time with ponies but we'd mentioned dolphins and he wanted to make sure we had time for that too; and again, customized-experience - he has great information to share, is more than happy to chat, but is also comfortable with silence and enjoying time on the water. While no dolphins to be seen on our trip, always a possibility with wildlife, he tried hard and that level of customer-service was appreciated. Thank you, Captain Casey!