Tips For Trips
Welcome back to another blog post presented by Marker23, my name is Captain Ozzy and I am a full-time fishing guide in the Topsail Island area. Today I would like to go over a few things that could help you before you hop on a charter boat. Before you book a guide I highly recommend that you shop around, check out websites and maybe even make a few phone calls. The purpose of this is to find the guide that you pair best with, so that you can make the most of your time on the water. For example if your goal is to catch a redfish on fly then I would check out websites and social media accounts to make sure the guide that I hire is a fly fishing guide. Another great thing to do before the trip is communicate with your captain, tell him or her what it is that you want out of the trip, whether that means a certain species or a certain way you like to fish ( fly, top water, trolling etc. ). Once you have hired a guide and communicated with the captain the next thing I would recommend doing is practicing, this is really relevant to fly fishing/ sight fishing charters. This is important because you want to make sure you are taking advantage of the shots that your guide provides, but if we are being honest we all miss more shots than we make. How ever practicing before the trip can lessen that ratio. The next step in the process is to finally meet up with your captain. Typically what will happen is, your guide will send you a location to meet up along with a time. It is a good idea to arrive early to the meet up spot because by the time you get on the boat and go over the safety briefing with your guide you can be underway to spot number one a little quicker. Lastly I would like to go over a few things you should bring with you, now every Captain is different but this is what I recommend bringing if you were to book a charter with me. Starting with polarized sunglasses, it can be pretty miserable if your on the water squinting all day because you don’t have any shades, outside of comfort polarized sunglasses make a world of difference when it comes to seeing through the water, trying to site fish with out them can be very challenging. Another good thing to carry with you is rain gear, here on the coast pop up storms are not uncommon especially in the summer months. With a good set of rain gear you can ride out the bad weather and get back to fishing when it clears up. Finally the last thing I recommend bringing is a sunscreen, I highly value sun protection and suggest carrying sunscreen and a hat with you on your charter. Now as far as food and drinks are concerned each captain will be different but I provide water and snacks on the boat but tell guest they are welcome to bring whatever they like if they don’t want what I provide. I hope this helps you on your next charter, thanks for tuning in and we will see you next time.
