Thomas Hennigen and his son, Tom, from Ireland had numerous conversations with me over the phone before chartering the Top Shot Sportfishing charter boat team to do some deep sea charter boat sport fishing in Fort Lauderdale, FL. He found us on Tripadvisor, and was impressed with our reviews from past customers and our five star rating. As they boarded the boat, I asked them what type of fishing they would like to do, and their reply was that they were leaving it up to us.
We stopped on our way out and picked up a dozen live Goggle Eyes from Andy’s Bait Boat. Fifteen minutes afterwards, lines were in 120 ft. of water at the sea buoy in Fort Lauderdale, 1.8 miles from shore. If you venture off another ¼ of a mile, you would find yourself in 500 ft. of water due to our extreme drop off. We started the morning trolling with two plainers down, one with a blue and silver sea witch in front of a double hooked Bonito strip and the other with a pink and blue sea witch. For surface baits we went with two Bonito strips and two Ballyhoos.
As we trolled south of the sea buoy in Fort Lauderdale over one of our 34 artificial wrecks, the first fish caught by Tom on the plainer rod was a 12 lb. Kingfish. I made a swing to go back over the wreck and the plainer rod went off again – hooked up! Thomas was our angler, and after a fifteen minute battle, Dave, our mate, gaffed a 24 lb. African Pompano while welcoming him aboard onto the Happy Day Today. From there we kept trolling around as the anglers took turns catching more fish.
It was time to do some kite fishing with live baits, so we put out the kites with live Goggle Eyes for bait. A Sailfish came by, swatted the bait off the hook, ate it and swam away – no cigar! Our next catch was a 7 ft. Hammerhead Shark – both father and son took turns angling the fish – they brought it to the side of the boat and was released. The fat lady started to sing – as we were bringing in the kite, with one bait out, the fish gods blessed us one more time with a 16 lb. Black Fin Tuna.
With mission accomplished and a total of 4 Kingfish, 8 Mahi Mahi’s, one Barracuda, one Hammerhead Shark, one Tuna and one African Pompano, it was now time to head back to the dock. The anglers retired into the a/c salon and enjoyed the relaxing trip back to the dock at Bahia Bar Yachting Center, 801 Seabreeze Blvd. Fort Lauderdale 33316. At the dock, Dave filet out the fish for the anglers to take home.
