I didn’t want to leave a review while still upset about my trip.  It’s now been 2 weeks and I want to tell the next guy what to expect.  First captain hillyboo is known to be an excellent fisherman in San Pedro, but he sends you out on his boat with someone else.  My experience was very disappointing.  I booked the trip months in advance after looking at several options.  I even found captain Hillyboo a few days before the trip just to be sure I was ready and knew where to be.
The day of my wife and I arrived to find nothing ready.
The guy that captained our boat had been called the night before to go out with us, he was not a full time employee of Hillyboo.  The boat was not ready, the tackle and rods weren’t loaded, the cooler was empty the gas tank was empty, the ladder used to get into the water while out fishing never did get put on the boat.  But hey we’re on island time and with professionals so just relax my wife and I said to each other. After an unimpressive start and stop at the gas station our one man crew/guide/captain took us out.
First order of business is now to catch sardines for bait. This done by slowly patrolling the shallows along the shore to find a likely spot, then drifting the boat while being ready with a hand thrown net. Simple enough, that’s how all the fishermen do it.  Problem was we had one man doing all of the above and having to drop all of it to regain control of the boat before it drifted into the dock or ran aground, or went into the mass of sargasso that was covering the entire shoreline several feet out.  I mention all this detail because that is how the bulk of my day was spent. It was 5 hours into my 8 hour day before we finally located and caught bait.  The frustration and anxiety of our captain and ourselves was understandably high.  We then spent a few hours fishing, and caught nothing.  We trolled live bait, we anchored and dropped bait. But had no luck at all.
I don’t blame anyone for the natural causes that made sardines harder to find, nor for the fish not biting.  I am still angry that Hillyboo knew months ahead that I was coming, and made last minute arrangements with one unprepared man, sent him out with no help and wasted my entire day.