Newcastle and Gateshead is a place full of proud people who are passionate about sharing the history, heritage and culture of the region with visitors and those new to the area.
Often pegged as a ‘best kept secret’, the region continues to gain attention on both a national and international stage as a world-class destination for visitors, locals and businesses alike despite a pandemic that disproportionately impacted the tourism industry. Last year Rough Guides highlighted Newcastle as one of the the top 20 fascinating second cities in the world and Holidu ranked Newcastle in their top 10 British cities with the top-rated cultural attractions for 2022.
This English Tourism Week we are celebrating the people who make Newcastle and Gateshead a place want to visit time and time again. Meet Alex Iles, regional tour guide and owner of Iles Tours. We sat down to talk tour guiding, self employment and the pandemic.
Could you talk a bit about your career journey and how you got into tour guiding?
I started work as a tour guide in 2012 because of the global recession. I had applied for a lot of jobs after university, but nothing came of it, and so after six months and talking to my family I decided to become self-employed. I loved the North East, its people, history, and geography and so decided to start a tour company to share the region with visitors and locals alike and tell stories I felt were being overlooked.
What is it like working for yourself (in the tourism industry)?
Working in tourism is hard. It’s a very competitive industry, which I enjoy because it pushes you to be the best you can be and keep yourself professional, work on your product and create stories that people hold onto and take away with them.
A lot of my time is spent researching, whether it’s reading archaeology reports, buying history books and learning something new or keeping up with current news so that I can tell my customers stories that are being created today.
Alongside that, I am constantly looking to create new tours and develop new ideas, so I’m often exploring and meeting new people who I can work with in the future. It sometimes feels like it never stops, particularly in the summer – it’s amazing, your feet don’t touch the ground!
Working for myself there’s lots of flexibility, I feel like I have more of a work/life balance. I take my own holidays working around the peak touring seasons which tends to be in the winter and spring now. It’s usually pretty quiet this time of year, so it’s not bad at all.
What is your favourite thing about your job?
Meeting people! It is so rewarding to meet people from all over the world and show them why the North East is such a great place to be. From British city breakers through to international travellers and Geordies who are just looking to do something different, I love hearing their stories and learning from them as well.
Even if I have told a story a thousand times, seeing someone’s reaction to it makes it so worthwhile. I often say to friends I am not a tour guide because I love history, but because I love people and the human story in all its amazing twists and turns!
During the height of the pandemic tours couldn’t take place, how were you able to adapt?
With no tourists you can’t do tours, so I started my own YouTube channel – Alex Iles UK. It was a way of still doing what I love and sharing it with the world, just using a different medium. I was constantly reading and learning something new that I could use when tours started again.
It has gone really well and I’ve kept it up now that restrictions have been lifted. It’s nice to have a new way of sharing the North East with people on the other side of the world, and I’ve even started to see people book tours because of it! I am looking forward to meeting a number of my viewers this summer which is a special treat!
What do you love about Newcastle and Gateshead?
I moved to Newcastle as a student in 2008 and never left. Growing up I travelled a lot for my parents’ work, so because of that I did not have anywhere which was ‘home’. When I moved here I was ‘adopted’ by the North East and love it.
Newcastle and Gateshead (I have lived in both, I loved living in a flat on the Dunston Staiths when I was first married) are so close to the coast, hillwalking in the pennies and cheviots, cities like Durham, York and Edinburgh and have everything that a big city has, while not having the negatives of being crowded and unfriendly! There are many different parts of the city depending on what you want to do, from food and drink to music and nightlife. Obviously, there’s also rich history and I hear there’s some good tour guides as well!