Redondo Beach Sportfishing

I searched and searched for the right place to take my husband Sportfishing for Father’s Day. All of the places here in the Los Angeles area have low reviews on Unilocal.I decided to just call this place and ask questions for myself. And am I glad I did! We went this morning for the half-​day fishing. Check-​in was a breeze and we were let on the boat on time. 7:30 a.m. Immediately, Morgon (sp)? came over and helped us with our fishing rods and told us how things were going to go. He could tell we were first timers. Megan cooked up some great breakfast sandwiches and burgers and therer were plenty of refreshments and snacks. Erick was the captain I think. He was very helpful throughout. He knew the spots to go to to help us all catch some nice fish! And always got excited when he saw the visitors catching fish. He definetly has a passion for fishing. Abraham gave good fishing tips & whenever people caught fish, someone was always there to help you reel it in and put the fish in your catch bag for you. Everyone worked as a team. All of the other people that were on board with us fishing were all helping one another. Everyone was all smiles except for when a couple of us got seasick :-) Thank goodness they gave us the comfort of «letting it go» overboard if need be. I had no idea I could get so seasick! But felt better after releasing. The coolest part was once we were heading back to land, they start «gutting» everyone’s catches and bagging them up for you. Remains were thrown to the birds and they knew it! They flew by our boat the whole way back! Lol. Sooo, I don’t know why everyone else has such a bad time, but we did not. Sometimes you have to try things out for yourself. Some Unilocalers don’t always have the best advice. I recommend you give it a try. We would’ve missed out on a great team of fisherman! So I am happy to write this review and to tell the team to keep doing what you’re doing because we enjoyed ourselves and we will definitely be back!
Only thing I wasn’t excited about was having to pay $ 40 for my 2 year old son’s ticket. He sat in my lap the whole time, didnt take up space and obviously didn’t fish. So next time, unfortunately, we won’t bring him.

If I could give less then one star I gladly would. Booked a trip a week in advance for Friday May 27^th. Drove all the way down. I get, «sorry we aren’t going out today not enough people». You really couldn’t have called? Missed a day off work and wasted gas and parking. Canceling my upcoming trip for 9 as well. Looking for other deep sea fishing places as we speak, ones that have the respect to call if canceled.

the captain was suck, yesterday (4-​1-​2016) he brought us to the area and just caught the small fish and release. And the captain just waste a lot of time for catching the small fish. I was pissed off and asked the captain to change the area for the rockfish. Then the captain brought us to caught rockfish less than one hour, then return back to harbor. For other sport fishing, such like Stardust, if they found that all of the anglers just caught the small fish and release, it will change the location or just go to deep sea fishing, not such like this captain. So this captain was really suck yesterday.
More over, when I browse the web site of the fish count report, that is ridiculous. The report was not truth. So don’t trust this Indian Sport Fishing…

If you can deal with «ocean time,» it’s all good!!! Some days are good, some days aren’t, so as long as you understand your worse day of fishing is better than your best day at work, and don’t get too pissed off when they come in or leave out a few minutes late, this is the perfect crew. We fished with Morgon last summer… he’s amazing… had Eric as a Captain this time, he was great… came down, hung out, BS’d with us, laughed at me catching fish after fish while missing my Moby Dick… it was comedy! To the haters, it’s not always a good day, and if you’re expecting a sailfish at ½ day prices off the point… perhaps you should grab your pesos and head to Mexico. :) Morgon/​Eric (or Erik… or Erick?), the key to my boat happiness is not ever hear the words, «There’s only 6 beers left on the boat…» ;) Thanks for a relaxing, low-​key, high fish count day!

Went on the Indian last week with a couple buddies because of all the skipjack hype and paid high $$ and only caught rockfish!
I think they just say any bull to hype up their sales. The food wasn’t that good either and we saw a lot of cockroaches. Maybe we should’ve used the cockroaches as bait and caught something better than rockfish. We’ll never go on that boat again! What a rip!!! Never believe what they advertise ever!!!

Been on the special many times never had one bad day of fishing yes some days suck but that’s why they call it fishing and the crew is top notch and the galley cook Megan cooks the best breakfast I have had for years and the rest of the crew are on point when it comes to helping you out so thank redondo special

Redondo Special are Scammers ! Over report fish count to get u in. Captain is a assss doesn’t move off same spot to save gas. 5 fish caught all day and they report 80… wtf? Deck hands are cool and deserve a better managed boat. Go down the street don’t waste time peeps !!

Went there yesterday in the hopes of getting into this tuna bite that everyone is reporting around Catalina Island. Redondo is 1 of those posting pictures of the deck filled with yellowtail. I’ve had problems with this outfit before to where you think you’re going after the big fish but instead they deside to stay inland and go for rock fish. This is how they suck you in. They report this get fishing with big numbers and guys holding up their prize catch. When I got there they start talking about how we should only use heavy rigs due to the size and strength of the tuna. Once we leave shore they say that since we only have a small group he didn’t have enough to cover the fuel to make it out to Catalina and thatwe will be fishing close to shore. Classic bait and switch. This is the third time this has happened. We had to catch our own bait, the boat never went above trolling speed, and we sat on spots that were not producing. All things that helped eat up the clock. Redondo is a joke, and they fooled me again. I paid $ 75 to go rock fishing. They raised their price due to the tuna bite and took us rock fishing instead. Theives and liars. At least the crew was nice but Capt David acted as if this was acceptable to charge people twice as much and only go out for smaller fish that were close to port. Word of advise, look into other landings unless you paying big bucks for a 10 hour boat ride.

So I decided to give Redondo a try after not fishing here for YEARS ! Now I remember why I stopped fishing here. The captain ERICK on the Redondo Special is a first class jerk. All he kept saying or should I say yelling at the fishermen was we don’t have a lot of bait when it’s gone we r going in I don’t care what time it is. What a looser ! The trip was suppose to be from 1:00pm to 6:00pm. The boat was 20 minutes late and we stopped fishing at 3:55 PM. We r less than 15 minutes from the docks. There were a lot of nice yellows landed but this so called caption SUCKS ! I will never fish here again !

Went out on the Redondo Special morning trip.
There was nothing on the website suggesting what they were catching out on the water, so once my cousin and I got there, we had to figure it out ourselves. I even asked the deckhand (Justin Bieber) what we were using and his response was «uhhhh i don’t know, like whatever you want i guess.» So we finally figured out that they were making everyone buy these rigs for 2 dollars so that we could go spend time before fishing to catch our bait. They didn’t even have bait on the boat! So we bought the rig for $ 2 each, proceeded to head out and spend over an hour catching the bait for the boat. Once we got out to the fishing grounds a couple hours later, again no information for the less experienced about how to rig anything up, what was the best lure to use or anything. We had to figure it out by asking other experienced people on the boat.
So on the first spot, 4 people on a boat of 30 people caught fish. 30 people is a lot for a boat that size which meant tangles were constant. The deckhands and captain will yell at the less experienced when you get tangled which is pretty demeaning, not all of us are expert fisherman. That Morgon guy is a total dick to everyone on the boat except the regulars. Unwilling to help, and acts like you’re just an inconvenience on his boat. Hates tying knots for people, hates sorting out tangles. I’ve never been on a boat where the deckhands were so inhospitable and unhelpful to their customers!
The other problem was captain Helmet Head driving the boat. This guy clearly has no idea where the fish are and obviously doesn’t do his research the night before. He’s lazy as well: never willing to help any of the customers, always yells when you do something wrong like get a tangle, very impatient, and very crabby to everyone. After the boat of 30 people caught 4 fish total, he moved to a few other spots only to completely give up when the boat wasnt catching. So at the 3^rd spot, he just sat down and gave up and refused to move the boat to another spot to possibly look for more fish. Not only that, but he and his jerk off deckhand, Morgon, proceeded to then argue in front of the customers about the game plan, which was never executed: the rest of the trip was spent sitting there burning time until they could go in and get rid of their customers.
I dont know if this boat is under new management or anything, but this new captain helmet head and his deckhand Morgon are the worst people in the world to be managing this boat. The Redondo special has really gone downhill in the past few years, now it’s a total joke.
My cousin and I went out on it twice this summer, caught nothing both times, and only came back on the second trip because we had a free rain check pass. Oh and to cap it all off, the boat itself only caught 4 fish among 30 people for the whole morning. Towards the end, we also couldnt even use all the bait that WE had caught because captain helmet head wanted to save it for the afternoon trip! They ran out of bait!!!
All in all, it was the worst fishing trip of my life, I hated every minute of it. My cousin and I will not be coming back ever again! I wish i could give 0 or negative stars on Unilocal but i cant, so 1 star.
FYI if you want a good fishing trip with friendly and helpful deckhands, go see Victor on the New Del Mar at Marina Del Rey sportfishing! Hey Victor!

This review is for the boat named «SPECIAL». It does the ½ day fishing excursions.
3 stars overall. I’ll explain in a second.
My partner and I took the afternoon ½ day excursion last Thursday. The morning was very crowded. This was our experience:
There are two people running the whole boat (the captain and the deckhand).
5 stars to the deck hand, Paul. He helps everybody (even though some don’t listen or take his advice). He knows his stuff. He’s an experienced fisherman and is happy to help. If there’s a lot of people, he might be a bit overwhelmed so be patient. Make sure you tip this guy well. The experience would be horrible if not for him. Oh… he’s tattooed all over and is one sexy MF’er — so that’s a bonus.
1 star to the A-​hole captain. His announcements to the paying guests sound like he’s being majorly inconvenienced to have you on his boat. He fishes himself instead of helping others or acting like a host. And he’s a bit pushy to have his favorite spot on the boat when he fishes. All that said, he does get the boat to and from the dock safely. I kind of wish he’d stay behind the wheel and off the microphone and leave the hosting to Paul, the deck hand.
(5+1) divided by 2 = 3 stars.
Now…besides the captain, the other drawback on this boat (and probably other’s like it) is that there are some «guests» who are more experienced and who treat the less experienced as though they are in their way. Fortunately, those people are the exceptions and not the rule. Some of the experienced guys are nice and quite helpful. I learned a lot from one in particular. He happened to catch the big fish of the day and even gave us a piece of it which cooked up superbly. But there are a couple of guys who I wanted to throw overboard with a big chunk of bloody fish tied to their backs.
The guy on the dock getting your license and taking your money (I’m so sorry his name is escaping me) is personable, knowledgable and quite funny if you talk to him a bit. He’ll tell you what you need to know beforehand. You can rent the poles and buy the weights and hooks if you don’t have equipment. The reels are a bit trick to cast but he can show you.
And one final note, bring some extra cash on the boat. You’ll want to buy the «bait hook» line from Paul. This is how you catch your live mackerel bait for later use. I think it was $ 4. There’s also a betting pool for the biggest fish caught — legal betting because your at sea. That was $ 5. Paul will filet your fish that you catch for $ 1 each (maybe it’s more if it’s really big). Tip him a couple bucks extra for each fish… And that doesn’t count the tipping that I gave for «the show» he does on deck. You’ll know what I mean.
All in all, I’d do it again.

Fished the Indian for the first and last time today. For 30 people they had one deckhand and we were left to untangle and the newbies tangles. No instructions to the newer fisherpeople even when they made multiple errors. The cook was more than rude and she quickly went to fishing and pushing the passengers around, even those who were much, much better than her. The choice of fishing spots was terrible as we bypassed the local hot spot to run 2 hours to another mediocre spot, fished there half an hour, then drove the two hours back to the local spot which was pretty much done for the day. We were promised Catalina but were told the opposite once on the boat. I have been on 20 or so boats over the years, but this is the first I will never, ever fish again. I just checked the fish reports and they have indicated we caught 21 yellowtail when there were only 5.

Leave to go on a full day and they don’t have bait! Deck hands are ok. Captain charged me to clean 2 fish and then lost them at the end of the day. Overall the Indian boat is not run well at all.

This was a waste of money. Its about $ 80 per person if you show up with nothing. They gave you a basic setup and I caught a single baby rock fish about 5 inches long. Meanwhile the deck hands are using different poles and lures and they’re catching almost one fish per cast. It was pretty neat, but this business is clearly not serving customer. The hands were very unhelpful and I caught jack-​shit. Oh yeah, meanwhile they were trying to get me to put $ 20 down in a betting pool for who catches the biggest fish. What a scam.
TLDR; These guys kind of suck and they don’t care if you have a good time. Unless you’re a well-​prepared fisherman, don’t do this.
P. S. A little girl was crying for about half of the time.

I don’t think the captain of the Indian knew what he was doing We moved most of the time and hardly had any time to soak our bait. We ended with only six fish while the rest of the fleet killed it. The only good thing was the light load. I’m guessing the light load was due to their inability to put you on the fish. Stay away from the INDIAN there wmare way better boats to fish on than this one.

I went the complete newbie rout. I do have poles, but since it was my first time fishing the SoCal waters, I decided to hold back on my own stuff and just use the rentals. Overall, the experience was pretty good and I’ll go back.
Rental Equipment: 2 star
I never expected much out of the rental equipment, but I did expect it to be a little more functional. The Reels don’t have line aligning spools, poor gear ratios lead to harder to lift fish, and I actually ended up breaking skin while luring one in.
Fish: 5 star
I haven’t caught fish in socal in a long time. I’m from Florida where the fish basically seem to gravitate towards every line I drop, but the captain did a good job of finding spots that had fish.
Boat: 5 star
Hey, it’s a fishing boat. I don’t have some unrealistic expectation. I expect a number on a wall for where I need to stand, but if it has a toilet, and a cabin where I can buy food then that’s pretty good.
Deck Hands: 4 – 5 star
They hooked up my tackle and taught me their common rig. For a dollar a fish, they sliced my fish up and handed me the fillets. I often wondered how much track they kept of the type of fish we lifted since I know some rock fish are not allowed to be caught, but since all the fish get the benze and their eyeballs pop on the way up they’ll likely die anyways if you throw them back.
Time to fishing: 5 stars
about 25 minutes until you get to your first fishing spot is pretty awesome. It gives you more time to fish.
Total Price with everything is about $ 85 a person
Pricing note, the website is wrong. Price is not $ 40, it’s $ 45
Poll Rental: ~$ 12 (won’t be renting these again)
Tackle purchase: $ 11 (won’t be buying here again)
Fishing license: ~$ 15, I don’t remember exact price
Website: 2 stars
Aside from having the prices wrong, I think the fish count is guessed. In total, two of us caught 13 fish total and people around us were catching around the same amount. We caught less than what was reported, but I don’t care that much since I caught about a fish an hour which I thought was pretty good. Website doesn’t do a good job of preparing you to fish, so here is a list of what to bring.
What to bring:
You need any type of reel that can get you down to 300ft, 2 – 3 times over with at least 20lb test line, at least. As far as tackle, you need 10 ounch weights. 8 ounce minimum since the currents just make your lines drift. Bring sunblock, size ⁴⁄₀ hooks, the weights, some snacks, shades, a hat

Love it went on it 3x already trying to go on it when the yellow tail are biting can’t wait. The deck hand are cool guys don’t forget to tip them they are extremely helpful

Here is a SCAM business — Booked the INDIAN Sports Fishing boat at the Redondo Beach Landing for Tuna fishing. When asked if the fishing reservation is to target Tuna. The guy over the phone would not honestly say NO, but would say,“oh it is offshore fishing I cannot say yes or no for tuna specifically”. Doesn’t he work for the landing and he could not answer a simple question directly? Another guy over the phone said, «yes for Tuna if no Tuna for Catalina Island.» The answers were contradicting and SHADY. Regardless, I have fished all over the world even in Canada at PEI for BFT aka «cows» weighing at 600 – 1,000lbs, etc, I wanted to see what Redondo Beach Sport Fishing offers given I have not experienced the services offered at this landing.
After you paid for the landing trip you have to drive further out to park your vehicle at another area where the boat is docked (don’t be fooled by the PHONY smiles and non-​value added «friendly talks» and customer service from the same guys who would not give me a direct answer if the trip was for tuna, which was what I clearly asked for clarification.)
After all the customers were in the boat about 30 minutes later away from dock the Captain of the INDIAN Sport fishing boat announced,“We are heading off to Catalina Island”, which he repeated many times to ensure the customers heard! Most landings if you paid for tuna fishing, the Captain will take customers to fish for tuna UNTIL the captain has exhausted all his effort and if no tuna is found in the end Catalina Island is the last resort to help customers bag some yellow tails.
The Redondo Beach Landing is a SCAM. Needless to say, they only had about 14 – 16 customers instead of 40 or so on that day for a limited load extended trip. All the customers were DISAPPOINTED even a 14 or so year old kid told his dad with a disappointing expression on his face, «Dad, Skipper just said we are going to Catalina Island» not for tuna”. This place is starving for business while other landing I called for tuna fishing are sold out! The Skipper must not know how to hunt for tuna except taking customers to the Catalina island to fish for cheap fish like mackerels, Bonita, and if you get lucky small yellow tails, and countless calico bass under legal size, which you end up catching and releasing. Or, there is not enough customers to justify for the fuel cost for tuna trip further out offshore!
Again, this landing is a SCAM. Misrepresented customer the trip is for tuna and being shady to lure tuna fishing customers as you know tuna fishing is in demand in this time of the year. I rather spend my money like other customers with other landings where the boats honestly target for tuna specifically and not taking customers to Catalina Island charging tuna fishing price!!!
Also, the INDIAN crew is understaffed of short of deck hand. The boat’s cook fishes on the boat and brought his friend to fish for free and taking up space customers paid to fish especially whenever the kelp bed is observed with lines tangled up customers’ line.
I will never be a customer again! First and last time only. BEWARE of the phony friendly customer services with a hidden agenda to lure your business advertising and misrepresenting a trip you are booking is for tuna but in reality for Catalina island fishing and charging customers close to tuna fishing rate.
Lastly, customers’ time is precious. Do not waste customers time when customers’ intention is to spend valuable time to fish for tuna on limited load extended fishing trip an all day activity!!!
Next step, report to the Better Business Bureau. SCAM operation indeed — the Redondo Beach Sport fishing so called «tuna» sports fishing services is for Catalina island fishing!!!
To all customers, do not just write a review on Unilocal.Also, report to the Better Business Bureau (BBB) if you run into unscrupulous business practices by these landings, or any business in general.

I always find it interesting how landings always get terrible reviews. Maybe people don’t realizing this is called fishing, not catching…
Maybe they think they are at Burger King and they can have it their way…
Or maybe they expect a Marriott experience on a fishing boat…
The worst thing about fishing, is stupid people. But you know whats even worse than stupid people who fish? Stupid people who piss and moan while fishing.
Anyways, I digress. Went for the first time on the Redondo Special and had a great time. Keep up the good work guys!

THE place to go for half day boat fishing. Finally got time to get on the water this past Monday before the end of rock fish season.
Went on the p.m. half day boat the departs daily at 1pm. Great conditions and very good fish counts in the past 6 weeks.
Bought my ticket at 12 noon with lots of spots available. They have you choose your spot on the boat but most of the time you can fish anywhere.
We had about 20-​ish anglers going out. Today’s bait, cut squid strips and live anchovies. Most fish bit on the squid.
Caught a few Boccaccio’s and a few other rock fish. No jackpot contenders…
Deckhands very helpful. Constantly circulating to help with tangles and getting the fish to the correct gunny sack.
Best part of the day… sunset
Will be back for more…