Grand Turk fishing trip on Princess Cruise

[eppefour]

Took a Princess fishing trip- Screaming Reels charter
26 Polar with twin Merc outboards
7 passengers- $179 each
Too many people for a 26' outboard
Crew was ok - but they took 1.5 hr to change ballyhoo trolling at 8knots
Trolled the blue water down the coast and back -no hits- thyen trolled the coral reefs for barracuda to get fish.- no depth finder- hand held radio- GPS turned off
There was a weed line but they didn't troll it- I guess they didn't want to work to keep lin es weed free- also did not troll close to floating timber for dolphin.
I got a nice sized barracuda
Boat was in bad shape- needed tlc-
3 hour trip- coming back in they could not get to dock- there were breakers in front of it-I don't think it would have been safe if he tried it- The breakers were almost at the dock. He would have had to follow on the back of the wave and u turn into the next breaker before it drove him onto the beac. they left us off at a commercial dock more than a mile away- they said a bus would come but we ended up walking back

[Jer]

I hope you enjoyed the cruise

[fishinmagician_IV]

We took a cruise a few years ago on one of the cruise lines. I had asked a question on another forum and the responses I had received were just what you talked about. They said most people on cruise lines just go fishing once, the Captains/or "whoever" know that and it's just what you describe. Give me your money for a few hours boat ride, sorry no fish, yeah RIGHT!

[La Gringa]

Is the charter part of the cruise line or a local outfit?

[Admin]

Dad ! Next time lets see if we can find you trips from someone off this site.
Atleast they will know in advance that if they give you a shitty trip that we will sit around and sip Jack on the Rocks and tell everyone they suck!

Someone take my dad on a bad ass fishing trip! The man has traveled the globe this year on a cruise ship and needs to get some real fish time.

Hope all is well

[aloop]

I was in Grand Turk on a cruise and could not get on any boats to fish on, booked earlier so I gave up, went para sailing and ultimate snorkeling instead. A 2 or 3 weeks later I came across a buddy who was on another cruise that stopped at Grand Turk the day before I was there, he got on a boat with 6 or 7 others, trolled for a while and hooked into a 65lb bull mahi, each person on the boat had a turn fighting the fish for 5-10 minutes. They got the fish into the boat, the capt said he was going to sell it at $6 a pound and then asked for a tip.

[eppefour]

I only went with the cruise line because we weren't there for a long day and you can't miss the ship if you are on a cruise sponsored tour. The fishing boats are not owned by the line. They are privately owned and just have a contract with the line. I pretty much expected what I got. Most of these trips have inexperienced fishermen. This trip had 2 guys from Cape May- 2 from Scotland- 1 from Sweden.
I will post pix when I figure out how to resize them while away

[La Gringa]

That's too bad because there are all kinds of great fishing here. (Not that I'm an expert, mind you..!!! )

[eppefour]

We cruise a lot and I have tried to do independent trips but it hasn't worked out. I had a trip planned for Grand Cayman 3 years ago, but the captain woulndn't refund the money if the seas were too rough to dock the ship. They have the same problem at Grand Turk-They were unable to dock 2 weeks ago due to rough seas. The dock there is unprotected. We missed St Kitts this trip for the same reason. Grand Cayman is a tender port for the cruise ships and it often gets cancelled due to conditions.