8 or 10 hours · the long day
Swordfish charters out of Key Largo
The gladiator trip. Eight hours, or the ten-hour day this boat actually keeps on the menu. Most people do not want a ten. This is why it exists.
From $1,500 for the boat · 6 guests · Key Largo Harbor Marina
Dan calls swordfish the gladiator. He-Man fishing. It is the one trip where a ten-hour clock is the point, not a typo left over from a rate card. The run out and the run home eat time. What is left is the fishing. Most guests do not want that many hours, which is why the rest of the menu stops at eight.
Book this if the group has talked about a swordfish and means it. Do not book it as a surprise for a family that wanted snapper and a swim. The day is long, the boat is serious, and the fish is not a sure thing. No charter that tells you otherwise is telling the truth.
Miss Chief is set up for the work: a 34-foot Crusader sportfisher, tower, outriggers, livewell, shaded cabin, and a head. Electric and conventional reels are aboard. The crew does the preparation that makes a long day fishable. You do the hours.
Eight hours is $1,500 for the boat. Ten hours is $2,000. Same rule as every other trip: six passengers, private, fuel and bait and tackle included, catch cleaned if you keep a legal fish. Sailfish and marlin are released. A swordfish, if the day produces one and the law allows, is a different conversation at the dock with the captain, not a promise in a paragraph.
What this trip is aimed at
- Swordfish
Aimed at is not the same as promised. The ocean has the final say.
Know before you board
- Eight or ten hours only.
- Not a family intro trip.
- No depth figure, because Dan does not publish one.
- No guarantee of a swordfish, or of any fish.
- Departs Key Largo Harbor Marina. Plan on an early start.
Bring
- Sunscreen, a hat, and polarized sunglasses
- Soft-soled or non-marking shoes, or bare feet
- Food and drinks for your group
- A light layer. The ride home can be cooler than the dock.
- Motion-sickness medicine if anyone needs it, taken before you board
- A phone or camera
- More food than you think. A ten-hour day is a long time between breakfast and the dock.
Anglers who already know they want a swordfish day and can give it the hours. Offshore. A long run, and a long fish if it happens. Dan has never published a depth for this trip, and neither will this page.