HOLLAND — Beth Felicelli never expected to be a business owner — but she knows a little something about passion.

Felicelli has been paddle boarding for about five years. The water sport requires a wide, thin board, on which participants lie, kneel or stand and propel themselves forward with their arms or — in Felicelli's case — a paddle.

"I just fell in love with it," Felicelli told The Sentinel. "I started paddle boarding on vacations, because it's such a great way to check out the city from a different perspective."

By day, Felicelli works in pathology at a local hospital. But after discovering her passion, she wondered if she could do more with it.

"For the past eight or nine months, my husband and I have been bouncing this idea around," she said. "It's totally out of my realm, but he's the co-owner and he does the boring parts, the accounting and the lawyers. It just fell into place."

This month, Felicelli launched Tulip City Paddle Tours, a unique, stand-up paddle boarding experience for locals and tourists alike.

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"My main thing is giving tours," Felicelli said. "I'll always start with instructions. I'm a certified paddle board instructor. I'll show the various strokes and we'll get out on the water and get them standing. Then, we go."

The two main locations for Felicelli's tours are Windmill Island and Pigeon Creek.

"The tour of Windmill Island is a fun way to see some landmarks of the city," she said. "The other is a little more intimate."

Tours are $50 per person, and Felicelli offers hour-long instructional classes for $25. For now, tours are scheduled to run through September, with an event or two in October.

"It involves Halloween costumes and paddling around," Felicelli said. "If the weather is nice, we might add tours in October. We'd like to start in May next year. When it's just been my friends and I, we've put on Dutch costumes during Tulip Time and paddled around Windmill Island. The tourists have gotten a kick out of it."

Learn more at facebook.com/tulipcitypaddletours.

— Contact reporter Cassandra Lybrink at cassandra.lybrink@hollandsentinel.com. Follow her on Instagram @BizHolland.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Tulip City Paddle Tours offers unique sights