Good Time Charters

Here are a couple of pictures of a mom and her two loving boys on board. Mom chartered the whole boat for a special outing with her two boys and she combined our marine life charter with a sunset cruise. What an amazing night and we personally think this the best time to do our marine life charter. We were out for four hours leaving at 4pm so by the time we got to our shell island all the other boaters had left, leaving the island all for us! The kids enjoyed swimming and finding all sorts of sea life including, conchs, whelks, calico crab, and sea stars. After a couple hours at the island we left and found lots of dolphin all throughout the bay, some feeding and some playing. Then we headed out to the Gulf side and watched an amazing sunset. We have such beautiful sunsets here on Fort Myers Beach. As we headed back to our marina we were able to watch the huge moon rise! What a sight and a perfect way to end the charter for our passengers.

What great weather we have been having! Sunny and warm is the forecast. Fishing has been fun with a lot of our regulars returning to go fishing with Capt Mike. And our dolphin tours have been filling up every day, and we have been seeing LOTS of dolphins and also quite a few manatee. Here are some recent photos.

They have finally hatched! Osprey chicks again, and 3 this time. We have been observing this pair of Osprey for about 7 years now and every year we watched their chicks grow and fledge. These chicks in the photo by our guide Cristina is of the chicks about about 9 days old. They are so cute and the mother feeds them well while the father stands guard. The pelicans are also starting to get their breeding plumage so this summer we will have baby pelican pics to post too! Their is a lot of bait fish around and the dolphins have been very busy feeding, and not as playful as usual, but they are still swimming alongside the boat and doing fun jumps for us to see. We have been seeing lots of manatee around too!

We are seeing some seasonal changes with our wildlife around Fort Myers Beach! The pelicans are getting their breeding plumage, Osprey chicks are hatching, the manatees are back, Cristina spotted a sea turtle on a recent tour, and Capt Mike has reported lots of baitfish and small shark in the passes. The weather has been amazing too with Lots of warm sunshine. Here are a couple of pics from a recent marine Life Explorer’s Charter. We saw lots of dolphin on that charter, and they didn’t do any of their usual jumps and chase our boat because they were too interested in each other! We were lucky enough to spy on a whole resident pod mating, and some were feeding on a school of mullet. In the same area that activity was going on we also saw a manatee. What a site. The kids found all kinds of shells and had a great time finding all sorts of sea life, including a really cool lined sea star. This charter was great fun went by too fast.

We are definitely warming up here in

Dolphin Tour Fort Myers Beach

Southwest Florida, with highs supposed to reach 80 degrees by the weekend! Capt Mike reported a great day of fishing on the water today catching, snapper, pompano, black tip shark, and mackeral. Thats a great sign of lots of bait fish around. Capt Joe had a Loop charter yesterday with some return customers and said they saw lots of dolphin, and had a great afternoon on the water. Capt Cristina did a kayak tour in the afternoon and saw lots of night herons, anhingas, and one lone manatee! Also on her recent coastal shelling and dolphin cruise they saw lots of dolphins feeding, they weren’t as playful as usual but still swam right next to the boat, and found lots of shells at the shell island. The photo here was taken by Cristina during a rcent tour where 6 resident dolphin, including Notch, were swimming alongside the boat We look forward to our trips for the rest of the week and the beautiful weather to come here at Fort Myers Beach.

What a great year so far, lots of dolphins and some new calves to add to the population, lots of fun shelling, beautiful weather and gorgous sunsets. In the dolphin picture is a mom with her new calf. See the faint vertical stripes on the calf? Those are the markings from where the baby’s skin was creased while inside the mother. 

Also here is a picture and message sent to us from a recent passenger with this cool horse conch that we found at our shell island during our dolphin and shelling cruise.“We truly had a blast! And will definitely be back to see you guys if ever in the area again.  And got some amazing pictures.  You guys were awesome!!!  I attached a couple of pictures of the super cool shell…”

Some recent messages from passengers:

“We had an awesome time! You were the best tour guide! Unfortunately the video I thought I took with the dolphins didn’t work, but I still enjoyed it. Please find the pic of my dad and the sea star attached. We will definitely come back next time we visit. We would love to have our kids experience it! Thanks again. John & Mandy”

“Thank you so much Cristina ! I love the picture !
We now have all our nice shells in the bathroom giving it a tropical flavour (to beat the dreadful weather outside). 
We enjoyed the cruise tremendously,  
Keep the good work, educating people to ecology and teaching them to understand and respect nature and wildlife is essential. 
Cheers, Laurence”

Our kayaking tours are in the calm serene waters of Estero Bay. Our guides take you into areas of the bay you can’t get to by boat and it is such a beautiful preserve area. Recently we have spotted many different bird species including night herons, anhingas, kingfisher, and Osprey. We also often see dolphins and manatee on these tours too. On a recent tour, our guide was able to catch some sea life from her kayak to show our guests on the tour.

Capt Mike has been really busy with fishing charters and has had a lot of regulars returning for season and a lot of new clients as well. We received this photo from a family that went fishing with Capt Mike last week. Our marine biologist, Cristina, has also been reporting lots of dolphin and now that our water temperature is approaching the 70s, even some manatee sightings. The Ospreys are busy nesting, and she noticed some of our pelicans starting to show their breeding plumage.

Capt. Mike of Good Time Charters reports another great week of trout fishing in Estero Bay.  The sea trout were found along the edges of oyster bars and points of mangrove islands with good water movement,  using jig heads tipped with live shrimp.  The jig heads proved effective bounced along the bottom and/or floated below a popping cork.  Redfish and sheepshead were abundant in the same areas using little to no action.  Often times just a chunk of shrimp on a jig head was enough to hook the sheepshead, notorious for stealing bait.  Best advice for the sheepshead is patience and a tight line, especially on these windy winter days.  Remember keeping your rod tip low and your line submerged in windy conditions will greatly increase your sensitivity and better your chance of a solid hook up.