Boat and crew were great!  And we saw a lot of whales.  But no one else was out fishing it was pretty evident we weren’t going to catch any fish. Guess I should’ve done my homework.  I just assumed with the big ocean there would be a lot of fish to catch in Hawaii, not so.

We booked half day trip for bottom fishing to get more participation, but we were told that trolling was the only option when we get on the ship. We got a bite from a marlin but that’s the only interaction we had. Had some communication with the captain and he tried sabiki in the end but still can not get a fish. I wasn’t able to see any live/dead bait being prepared which could have lowered the chance.
Another area I suggest improving is the booking process. I paid 20% deposit a month prior on Fishingbooker website but was contacted several times by the tour provider(Hawaii Ocean Adventure). I confimed to be paying in cash but they insisted me providing credit card information including cvv number. And I was also little confused about the ~9% taxes added.
Overall I would say it’s a neutral/negative experience. Have to explain to my friends why we they are just sitting for 4 hours and calm them down. I suggest tour provider do better preparation and improve booking transparency.

This was the worst guided fishing experience I’ve ever had. That being said we still had a good time shark diving. I’ll explain, the captain (Ryan) contacted me the day before the trip, to inform me that he was not in Hawaii, and that a different crew would be taking us fishing. Also, on the same day his office personal contacted my wife (who was quite rude) and tried to talk her out of fishing and instead go snorkeling (which at the time seemed very odd). Once we were out on the water it became apparent that the (2) guides were not professional fishing guides, they had some experience but not what you would expect or want out of a fishing captain. After visiting with them, we found out that they mostly do shark diving expeditions, not fishing trips, but were filling in for the absent captain. Since we weren’t catching any fish, the guides offered to take us shark diving. Which I must say was an incredible experience and the guides absolutely knew what they were doing in this regard. So even though the fishing was a compete bust, between the diving (snorkeling), and the abondance of sea life mainly the humpback whales we had an enjoyable trip. The shark diving was such an incredible experience I wanted to book a shark dive for my father and sister who had not gone out fishing with us. The guides told me they had two openings on a dive scheduled for the next morning, and I could call the office to book it. The office lady was once again incredibly rude even threating to hang up on me, but I got the trip booked. When my family went out the next morning to dive at the buoy where the sharks hang out. Another (apparently more professional company) had already booked the time at the buoy, so they had to do there dive on the float. The point of the story, this was a very unprofessional mismanaged outfit, with great diving guides, located in a beautiful and abundant area.

Probably wouldn’t use fishing booker, or use this charter again. False advertising.. on the description it stated, we would be able to do different types of fishing such as jigging, popping, and spinning, as well as trolling.  Asked the owner of the boat and they said they never wrote that they do different types of fishing… When we got there we were only offered trolling, and was told we should of told them ahead of time, which I did ask what type of fishing we would be doing and never got a response…. on the other hand… captain Braxton was amazing, would 110% go back on the boat with HIM as captain, if we were offered different types of fishing as stated in the description of the post.