I have been a tour guide for 20 years and for the last few years had been happily touring England and Wales enjoying showing  American groups the delights of the British countryside and heritage.
I enjoy travelling and through the winter have been exploring the world. I was on an extended trip through Africa when I heard of the increasing problems Covid was causing in the travel industry .
Shortly after getting home, like everyone else, I found myself in lockdown with my inbox constantly pinging with job cancellations including several into the next year - 2021.  Once I'd sorted those long-intended home jobs and got some chickens for company, I began to wonder what I could do to with the hours - increasingly looking like months - stuck at home when I was used to roaming the country with enthusiastic holiday makers solving their problems as a tour manager and entertaining them with an interpretive commentary.
I have always believed in dividing my time to ensure I get a good mix of physical activity, brain exercise, socialising, creativity and having a goal to work towards.  I was listening to a business blog and heard a comment about wise companies spending in a recession and saving in a boom.

Excitement as the local lockdown ended as the school holidays started. The caravan parks and self-catering properties reopened and the town began to fill up - very strange after roaming the empty streets to see families with Liverpool accents crabbing on the quayside. The town walls and castle were still closed and the tiny nature of Conwy's specialised food  shops precluded social distancing. So the only tour I was able to operate was The Trail with Tales from the Lady of Wales. 

I had cycled around the local caravan parks distributing posters but many of them had their communal areas closed still. Local shops were very helpful in displaying the material and visiting them give me a chance to meet and chat with locals.  
I had publicised the meeting point to be outside the local Tourist Information Centre where there was shelter and seats for those waiting. However, these had been closed off due to the crisis and, as the building was shared with the Post Office and social distancing queueing was in operation, I agreed to have my meeting point over the road.The tours started and, I had a chance to review how things were different from my original thoughts.
Considering we were in international lockdown, I was surprised that so many clients - well over half -were from overseas when I expected mostly Brits. On chatting to them I discovered most were working in Britain and usually spent their leave visiting family abroad and, when this became not possible, decided to explore more of the UK instead.
I was very lucky that two of the these early bookers were Ashley and Rotem from ​https://www.myisraelphotos.com​  who kindly let me use their very professional photographs.
Another thing I discovered was that people had never used and did not understand the receiver machines. They thought that they were for pre-recorded commentary or translations but nearly all found them useful allowing for freedom to spread out or find a shady or dry space. Once the town walls opened the sets particularly came into their own.

 Other things I discovered working with real live clients, was the need for  a quiz to motivate the younger audience. I prepared a multi-activity one that allowed them to run around to find things where it was safe to do so but to focus on what I was saying in areas with traffic or other hazards.
Feedback was really good including those all important reviews. from AirBandB experiences, and Tripadvisor reviews to date all have all been 5 star!

One of the differences between a professional and amateur guide is the mindset of the tour in both delivery and creation.  An amateur guide will expand their personal interests into a tour and indeed there is a lot to be said for that as clients love a passion but, here is the rub, the guide must always be aware of the clients' needs and interests and moderate the structure and depth of the route, stops and commentary to take account of this.  To a  professional guide the tour is a product. That may sound derogatory but not at all!  A good product puts quality, added value and customer needs first.

Clients come to a guide and trust a) the facts are correct and b) they would be imparted in a varied and entertaining manner but there would be some sort of sorting of relevance towards understanding the town. Of course this must not be just learned by rôte but sorted in one's internal memory file to mix and match and slotted in the narrative  according to the clients`' leanings. The guide also has a role of host - i.e. to facilitate introductions to specialists or characters in a town so getting to know locals - especially experts and characters is pivotal. 

Next the fun bit - the research! Obviously, being a resident with an interest in history and having studied for my qualification and taken tours around town over the preceding decades, I had a background knowledge. However, to give added value I needed to drill down deeper and find those stories that expanded understanding of the town and were entertaining.  I asked for tales of local characters on the community Facebook page, chatted to locals and wandered around the graveyards.  I also undertook desk research and found the excellent https://historypoints.org really useful.