I booked a full day trip with Hook’N up Sport Fishing for July 15, 2020. Luckily none of the Covid 19 closures had any impact on the trip. I booked the trip for my family of 4 so we would have the whole boat to ourselves. I communicated through the message feature here on fishing **hidden content** several times and each time had a response in a timely manner. One of my questions I asked the Captain was that we would have the whole boat to ourselves and he confirmed that we would.

The day of the trip we found the boat in the slip at the marina and was greeted by Captain Dwayne and First Mate Ricky. They were preparing the boat for the trip and we remained not he dock until they were ready for us to board. Once on board we were given a brief tour of the boat and the Captain went over the safety points, equipment, etc. The boat was certainly not as clean as it appears in the picture but it is a fishing boat that gets used everyday so that is to be somewhat expected. What was not expected was the Captain decided to bring his son on this trip. We entered the cabin to find his son laying on the couch. We didn’t think much about it at the time other than it was slightly odd to have an extra person on board. However, we left the marina in a timely manner and the weather was looking good for a great day on the water.

Once out we started trolling and began our fishing experience. The bite was slow to start but that wasn’t for a lack of the crew trying. They were throwing everything and anything and the fish just weren’t biting to begin with. But its called fishing, not catching, lol. First Mate Ricky worked extremely hard changing out lures and bait, trying different things. He was working mulitple lines at a time and I don’t think he had a moment to sit down the whole trip. He was very knowledgeable and personable to me and my family. He was great with the kids as well! He really made the trip enjoyable!

We moved offshore a ways and did some fishing and were greeted with several sharks by the boat. First Mate Ricky brought them in close and my son hooked a good 6 footer and was in the fighting chair for over a half hour to bring him in. Definitely the highlight of the trip. First Mate Ricky was there every step of the way coaching him and encouraging him the whole time until he landed him.

After that we did some bottom fishing and the bit picked up some. It was hard to get the fish in the boat because we kept running in to sharks and they would eat the fish as we would try to bring them up. Kind of crazy but true!

As the day went on, the Captain’s son was fishing as well. This wasn’t a huge deal at first but it became more of a problem as he was constantly in the way as my family was trying to fish. First Mate Ricky was trying to be as accommodating as possible but he was in a tough spot with having to tend to us and still take care of the Captain’s son. I’m not trying to be mean but I paid a lot of money for the fishing experience for my family. I confirmed with the Captain that we would be the only ones on the boat and then showed up to find an extra person. I normally wouldn’t mind something like that but he became more and more obtrusive as the day went on. At one point he even went in the cooler and took some of the soda out that we had personally brought on board. Again, not a huge deal but earlier in the day he was told that everything except the water in the cooler was stuff that we bought and brought on board. Overall it was just unprofessional in my opinion and did take away from the overall experience. When you are paying for the full experience then that should be the focus, not that and babysitting the Captain’s kid.

I would fish with First Mate Ricky again in a heartbeat. However, I will not book with Hook’N Up Sport Fishing again as I don’t believe they are customer oriented to the extent that I was expecting. Next time I will take my money to another charter.