Boat owners

I was wondering how many of you Pier guys also had (motorized)boats to take out fishing. If so what kind if you don't mind sharing

The want of a boat comes and goes for me. Looking for a way to justify (not)getting one.

My only boat is my canoe I built.

I have an old boat, but I'm not sure how much longer I will have it. I have grown quite fond of the pier.

Boats are work. You have to have a lot of time and a bit of money or a lot of money to pay people to keep it up. I used to think about what kind of boat I would buy if won the lottery, now I think about what kind of charters I would take. Just getting the thing out of storage, launching, cleaning up and flushing the engine and putting it back in storage is a lot of work, besides the upkeep - then you have to clean the fish.

If you are going to buy a small boat I would say that the number one accessory (besides a GPS fishfinder and other necessaries) is a trolling motor that will hold you in place over these little reefs that dot the waters off Alabama. If you want a larger boat it should be able to get to the floating oil rigs for big game - but you really have to want that badly.

You may be seeing my old boat for sale on this site pretty soon.

Edit: Don't get me wrong, having freedom to get out on the water and catch fish or run crab traps is a big deal, but it is work and it is not every day that the weather lets you get out. Having friends who share in the work helps a lot. Owning a boat has to be in your blood.

I should add, I'm coming up on my 72nd birthday.

best two days of a boat owners life... the day you buy it and the day you sell it.

I actually love fishing out of the Hobie anyway

That was supposed to be an exit to a previous post. I sold all my boats except a 10ft jon years ago when I started kayak fishing. Not that I wouldn’t mind having one but it’s not in the retirement budget.

First thing it go into this knowing that a boat is a money pit and you can't justify it by the amount of fish you catch, only by the pleasure it brings you!

I had a 1987 Proline 20' CC from 1998 to 2003. Paid $5,000 for it. Put at least another $5k in repairs into it over the years I had it. Plus storage, insurance, gas & oil. Back then, covered storage was about $1k/year.

It was a great hull, we fished that it hard, offshore and inshore, as often as the weather allowed, from late February to October. It had a 50 gallon tank, I'd run it up to 20 miles offshore. Most gas we even burned was 30 gallons. I paid for the boat & storage, my buddies paid gas, ice and bait. We had a blast. Like I said, the hull was great. Rest of the rig was one repair after another, tires, wiring, fuel pump, lift solenoid, blown head, stripped gear in lower unit, etc.. Finally, when I added it all up, I could not justify keeping it. Sold it for $4K in 2003. And glad I did.

So if you are getting a larger boat, just go into it with an open mind. Its expensive.

My current boat is a 15' Smokercraft with a 25 hp I use for inshore and duck hunting. A lot cheaper to run and maintain!

The big question for you is where do you want to fish? If its all inshore/nearshore, then if it were me, I'd get a 17-18' bay boat or small CC, like a Palm Beach 175, with a trolling motor and a 115 4-stroke. Easy to tow, easier and less expensive to run and maintain. Pick the right day and you could still run out and catch a snapper off the close reefs. Never put anything but ethanol-free gas in the tank.

If you want offshore, then it just depends on how much $$$ you want to spend.

I like pier fishing, but I also enjoy bay/lagoon fishing for reds/specks and gigging flounder. So I bought a Pelican 10 ft pontoon, powered by a salt-water trolling motor. I had another one for years that I used, successfully, in bays, lagoons and even big freshwater lakes. It's stable and two people can easily fish from it. I don't need a ramp, just a place where I can park near the launching spot.

Presently, as I near year #65, I can still handle it myself. But I can foresee the day when it becomes more than I can lift. Until then, I'm looking forward to adventures! At some point, either this fall or next May-ish, I'd love to take it out into the Gulf on a calm day and try to catch a king mackerel from it. It's way more stable, from my perspective, than a kayak and kayakers do it all the time!

We're still about three weeks from our closing in Foley and about four weeks from moving in. So I'll have a little time to scout out the area for great places to launch from!


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It seems every time I get the itch to buy a boat, it takes a bit encouragement from others to rethink it. I hadn't thought about the charter route as an alternative to spending money on my own boat. I was looking at a less than 20 ft center console (aluminum ) of some kind to begin with.

Guess I need to start making friends with people who own boats.:D

"Best boat is your buddies boat"!!!

If you are going with a CC, I'd go fiberglass: quieter, heavier (more stable) and cooler on the feet. Plus no hull corrosion worries.

I don't get to the pier as much as I would like but I've always had a boat or three.

Current one is a 1999 McKee Craft 1800 dual console with a 150 Johnson OceanPro and an xi5 remote controlled gps enabled saltwater trolling motor. I paid $4500 for that boat a year or so ago and put $600 in the trolling motor.

She has a 60 gallon poly tank and gets 2.5 mpg at 40ish mph with a top speed of just under 50 (150 mile range +/-). I run her offshore up to 50 miles (I have a locator beacon attached to a self inflating life jacket with a lifting harness that is also worn at all times) out of Carrabelle, FL. We keep her in a carport at our house and I do the work/maintenance. I absolutely love it and it's the best boat for the salt of that type that I've ever had. We did live on a 35 Viking for 4.5 years once but feeding and maintaining her took a lot more out of the old wallet than the 18.5 footer. I am not interested in having one too big to tow at this point in my life.

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