True North Charters & Tours
A website for True North Charters & Tours, a local crew showing visitors the Bay of Islands from Cox’s Cove, Newfoundland.
- Client
- True North Charters & Tours
- Industry
- Boat tours and charters
- Services
- Web design, Astro development
- Tools
- Astro, Lenis, Vercel
The site route
- 01Where we are
- 02Services
- 03Cruise ships
- 04Gallery
- 05Book an experience
Where it started
True North’s original site at truenorthtours.ca opens with a large oval logo and a yellow headline over a sunset photo, with everything else behind a tabbed menu. We gave it a warm, editorial feel and brought where they are, the services and the cruise ship section onto one page, with “Book an experience” in reach throughout.
Original site: truenorthtours.ca
The brief
True North offers boat tours, fishing, sunset cruises and custom shore days, including for cruise ship passengers. The site had to feel personal and local, show the full range of days on offer and make booking the obvious next step.
Our approach
True North sells a personal day out, so the site had to feel like a local welcome. We led with the place and the people, brought the services and the cruise ship offer onto the homepage instead of hiding them behind tabs, and made it easy to call or email from any section.
What we did
We designed and built the site in Astro with a warm, editorial feel: where they are, the services, a section just for cruise ship guests, a gallery and “Book an experience” always in reach.
What it does
The features that do the work for visitors and for the business.
Choose your kind of day
Boat tours, fishing, sunset cruises and custom days, side by side.
Where we are
Cox’s Cove and the Bay of Islands, so visitors know where to go.
Cruise ship guests
A section for passengers with limited time ashore.
Gallery
“A little of what awaits”: the coast in pictures.
Guest memories
Good days and lasting memories, in the guests’ own words.
Start with a hello
Two tap-to-call numbers and an email link.
What changed
Area by area, what the original site did and what the redesign does instead.
- First impression
- BeforeA large logo and a long paragraph that doubles as the page’s main heading.
- AfterA short headline, “Newfoundland, your way.”, over the coast itself.
- Services
- BeforeServices, cruise ship information and the gallery each sit on a separate page behind a tab.
- After“Choose your kind of day” and the cruise ship section are on the homepage.
- Contact
- BeforeNo phone number or email to tap on the homepage.
- AfterBoth phone numbers are tap-to-call, with an email link under “Start with a hello.”
- Search results
- BeforeA general welcome line in search results.
- AfterA description that says where and what: the Bay of Islands from Cox’s Cove, boat tours, fishing and sunset cruises.
- Performance9080
- Accessibility71100
- SEO92100
- Best practices7993
| Measure | Before | After |
|---|---|---|
| Page weight | 213 KB | 2.7 MB |
| Files loaded | 15 | 25 |
| Main content visible | 2.4 s | 2.1 s |
| Page blocked by scripts | 60 ms | 470 ms |
Google Lighthouse, mobile, home page of the original site and of the redesign, measured 8 November 2026. Scores are out of 100 and vary a little between runs.
The result
A welcoming site that tells visitors exactly what kind of day they can have, and who they will spend it with, then turns that into a booking.
Start a project
Tell us what you need and when you need it live. We reply with honest advice and a fixed price, and if we are not the right fit, we will say so.
Book a discovery call
A free 30 minute video call. Talk it through before you commit to anything.
Pick a time