Somewhere the tide is right. Book that morning.
Whether the skipper supplies rods or you bring your own. What a half day offshore costs against a full one. Which lakes freeze hard enough to drill. Reviews of fishing trips you can book anywhere in the world.
An Arctic fjord, a Florida drift boat, a hole in a Lapland lake, an Alaskan charter.
Four mornings that show what the range of a fishing trip actually is. What each costs, and what the people who went out say.
01The big oneArctic Fjord Cruise & Fishing ExperienceOut past the islands from Tromsø on a boat with a heated cabin. More travellers have been on this one than any other trip on the site.
02The cheap morningDrift Fishing Trip off the Coast of Fort LauderdaleA drift boat off Fort Lauderdale, rods and bait in the price. Four hours, no experience, no licence to sort out yourself.
03The ice dayIce Fishing ExperienceA sledge ride out onto a Rovaniemi lake, a hole drilled for you and a short rod. The fish are small and that is not the point.
04The serious dayKetchikan salmon and halibut fishing charterKing salmon and halibut out of Ketchikan with a skipper who fillets and packs the catch. Book it before the season is spoken for.
Three American fishing days, and they could not be less alike.
Salmon and halibut off the Alaskan panhandle, drift and deep-sea boats out of the Florida inlets, and a guide rowing you down a Wyoming river. Pick the coast first, then the boat.
A charter is the whole boat, and that changes the price of everything.
Private hire buys you the schedule, the water and the skipper’s attention. A shared or party boat splits the fuel and puts you shoulder to shoulder at the rail. These are the boats travellers rate highest either way.
Six coastlines that fill their charter boats first.
A frozen lake inside the Arctic Circle, two American coasts that could not agree less on what a boat is for, a Cabo marlin fleet, a Caribbean charter dock and a Greek caique that stops to swim. Six places to fish, and the best morning in each.
The fishing trips more travellers take than any others.
Every boat, lake and ice hole on the site →The boats and the ice holes that fill before the rest, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
Arctic Fjord Cruise & Fishing Experience
Cruise Tromsø’s winter fjords, fish for cod, watch eagles and wildlife, and enjoy hot drinks, thermal suits, and fresh fish soup onboard.
From · $152
Read our review →
2
Cooking Class Hoi An:Local Market, Basket Boat, Fishing & Cooking
from $28
3
Hoi An Cooking Class(Market,BasketBoat Crabfishing&Cooking Class)
from $28
4
Hoi An Cooking Class(Local market,Basket Boat,Fishing & Cooking)
from $28
5
Market Experience with Optional Fishing and Cooking
6
Snowmobile and Ice Fishing Adventure with Lunch
from $222
7
Makarounas Fishing Boat Trip with swimming stop and BBQ on board
from $78
8
Drift Fishing Trip off the Coast of Fort Lauderdale
from $85
Four things about a fishing trip that catch people out.
A fishing booking has more small print than almost any other day out. None of it is complicated, and all of it is easier to read now than at the dock.
- 01The licenceOn most charters the boat’s licence covers everyone aboard, and the price says so. Guided river and lake days in the USA often do not: you buy a state permit yourself, sometimes online the night before.
- 02The seasonIce needs a hard winter, so Lapland and Alaskan lake fishing run roughly January to April. Alaskan king salmon runs are measured in weeks. Marlin off Cabo peak in the autumn. A summer date is not always a possible date.
- 03The swellOffshore trips cancel on wind, and a small boat past the reef line is a genuinely rough hour. Inshore, bay and lake trips run in weather that keeps the big boats tied up.
- 04The catchSome boats fillet and bag what you land, some are catch and release by law, and some charge for cleaning. If eating it is the plan, check that line before you pay.
What a morning on the water actually costs.
Every trip on the site, grouped by the per-head price. A shared drift boat and a private sportfisher are the same activity and nowhere near the same money.
Shared drift boats, party boats out of the Florida inlets, bay trips and a short session on the ice.
The standard half day: a fjord cruise with rods, a reef charter, a guided lake morning with lunch on the fire.
Full days offshore, private hire, the Alaskan salmon and halibut boats and a guide to yourself on a river.
- 1Snowmobile and Ice Fishing Adventure with Lunchfrom $222
- 2Fishing Sea Safarifrom $223
- 3Fishing & Fjord Cruisefrom $198
Ice fishing is the only trip where the boat is the lake.
A sledge or a snowmobile out to a spot the guide already knows, an auger through half a metre of lake, and a short rod over the hole while coffee boils on a fire. Rovaniemi runs more of these than anywhere, and Fairbanks does it in a heated cabin.
Three fishing days you cannot get any other way.
Plenty of places put you on a boat. Drilling through a frozen lake inside the Arctic Circle, chasing squid under a lamp at midnight and holding a spear on a Hawaiian reef are not on anybody else’s itinerary.
Fishing through the ice
The guide reads the lake before you get there, because thickness is the whole safety question and it changes week to week. An auger takes a couple of minutes to cut through, the rod is barely longer than your forearm, and what comes up is usually perch or a small pike. Most operators run January to April and end the morning with a fire, a kettle and whatever was landed.
- 1Snowmobile and Ice Fishing Adventure with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 879 reviews
- 2Fairbanks Ice Fishing Expedition in a Heated Cabin with Fish Cookout★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 461 reviews
- 3Ice Fishing Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 379 reviews
Squid under a lamp
Boats leave at dusk off southern Vietnam, drop anchor and switch on a bank of lights over the side. Squid come up to it, and the tackle is a hand line with a weighted lure you jig by feel. Dinner is cooked on board out of what the boat catches, which is why these trips sell as much on the meal as on the fishing.
- 1Phu Quoc Sunset and Night Squid Fishing with Dinner★★★★★★★★★★ 3.3 · 93 reviews
- 2Koh Samui Day and Night Fishing Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 37 reviews
- 3RedRiverTours – Enjoying Sunset & Night Squid Fishing★★★★★★★★★★ 4.0 · 17 reviews
Spearfishing on a breath
No tank, no compressed air: you fill your lungs, drop down the reef wall and come back up. Beginner lessons spend most of the session on breath-hold and safety with a buddy before anyone loads a spear, and the legal size and species limits get gone through on the beach first. It is the one fishing trip where the swimming matters more than the tackle.
- 1Hawaiian Reef Spearfishing Lesson for Beginners on Kauai★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 67 reviews
- 2Discover Spearfishing course★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 57 reviews
- 3Spearfishing in Chania, Crete (price is per group)★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 17 reviews
Four fishing trips that run on somebody else’s calendar.
Most of this can be arranged from a hotel lobby the night before. These four run on salmon runs, ice thickness and a boat that only takes six people, and none of them care when your flight lands.
- 01Ketchikan salmon and halibut fishing charterThe Alaskan runs are a few weeks long and the good skippers are booked by regulars from one season to the next.
- 02Snowmobile and Ice Fishing Adventure with LunchIt needs a lake frozen hard enough to drive on, which is January to April and shortening.
- 03Private Fishing Trip “All Inclusive” in Cabo San Lucas, MexicoA private boat is one party a tide. When it is gone it is gone, and the peak weeks go first.
- 04Phu Quoc Sunset and Night Squid Fishing with DinnerThese sail at dusk on a fixed departure with a small deck, and the boat does not wait.
By place — coasts, lakes and fjords
By kind of trip — offshore, inshore, ice or fly
Chase the season and you can fish every month of the year.
Sep–OctBoats and lakes added to the site this week.
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