[Van]

We chartered once out of Marathon and twice our of Islamorada. IMO the fishing in Islamorada was much much better. Different but better.

First day on Marathon I took a nice big amberjack, my buddies got kingfish and mangrove snapper. Several small grouper that had to be released. We took our catch to a restaurant where they cooked it up in fine fashion...What a feast !!!!!!!!!

Next charter was on Islamorada. Right after getting bait, we started moving and saw sailfish free-jumping. Out goes a bait and I'm on. Fish was screaming the drag and staying down. The Capt just followed the fish without getting up next to it. After about 10-15 minutes, it decides to go airborne 2-3 times and its off. Estimated 70lbs. I told the guys I felt like Wes Welker !!! We proceeded to fish more and got black fin tuna, BIG kings and Barracuda. All these fish fought hard.

We had another charter with the same capt two days later and told him we would like to concentrate on sails. No problem.... He headed east and the fish were busting bait but were spotty. Several more chances when we got close but no hook-ups. At one point there were probably 5-6 sails around us showering bait. I looked down when something caught my eye and a nice one swam right by the boat. We saw more free-jumpers and a couple of other boats hooked up.

All in all it was an awesome trip. I took video of sails busting bait, but cant post them here. But here are some various pics.

We are already planning a trip for next year (maybe two)......