Tow Your Boat or Rent One?

Towing your boat to fish distant waters can be viable if you plan to spend more than a week there. Sundry Photography / stock.adobe.com

For anglers up north, ­cabin fever hits hard in March when you can’t even fish through a hole in the ice. The desire to do some real fishing is strong, and one of the best ways to get a fishin’ fix that will hold you until real spring arrives is to head south to the Florida Keys, where the peak fishing season is just starting to light up. But do you wake your boat from its winter hibernation and trailer it down, or should you rent a boat there?

A lot depends on how much time you have available. If you only have a week off, getting your boat and trailer in good working order will eat up a day, and even if you pull a marathon road trip, that kills another couple of days, assuming decent weather en route. Then you burn another two days on the return trip, leaving you with only three days of fishing. If you have 10 days or more, however, towing your boat south makes more sense.

Tow-It Pros

Let’s go over the pros and cons of towing your own boat south to the Keys. First, here are the pros.

• Taking a boat you are familiar with is a huge advantage; you know its quirks, capabilities and electronics.
• You don’t have to pay boat-rental fees.
• The boat can hold all your fishing gear and luggage.
• If it’s far enough into spring, you probably won’t have to rewinterize your boat, and it will be ready to go fishing when the weather at home warms.
• You can fish just about anywhere you want without any restrictions in the rental agreement.

Tow-It Cons

So, what are the downsides to towing your own boat south to fish the gorgeous waters of the Florida Keys?

• You will spend a lot on gas. A truck pulling a 4,000-pound boat will probably get half its normal miles per gallon. So, if you were getting 18 mpg before, expect it to get around 9 mpg when towing your boat. If it’s 2,000 miles round trip, that’s about $777 in fuel if gasoline is $3.50 a gallon. Then there’s the wear and tear on your vehicle and your boat trailer.
•  When a boat sits dormant on a trailer for months, bad things tend to happen. If you have a trailer problem on the road, finding parts on a timely basis might be challenging and could steal away precious vacation time. When you reach your destination, the winter gremlins can create boat problems that take away vacation time to fix.
•  After all that driving, you won’t be as refreshed as you would be if you flew down and spent your entire vacation fishing and diving.
•  If the weather turns bad, you will have towed the boat for nothing.  

There are times and situations when renting a boat is the right move. For vacationers with ­only a week off, renting a boat is probably the best call. Yet, there are other factors to consider that will help you make the best possible decision.

Read Next: Long-Distance Boat Trailering

There are times and situations when renting a boat is the right move. Joe / stock.adobe.com Rent-It Pros

Here are the main upsides of renting a boat to fish the Keys.

• It’s really convenient. You take your gear to the rental location, load the boat and go. The attendants even fuel it and clean it up for you. (Of course, you pay for the gas.)
• Rental locations are plentiful. Almost every key has a boat-rental operation. Key Largo, Marathon, Big Pine Key and Key West have many. 
• There’s a wide variety of rental boats, ranging from skiffs to 30-something-footers.
• You can try out boats you are considering purchasing.
• If you are not catching fish, you can charter a boat with a guide to learn how to take advantage of the local bite.
• If you rent a boat by the week, the average daily rate decreases dramatically. A 22-foot Cobia or Sailfish with a Yamaha F150 can be rented at vacation​boatrentals.com for $1,450 a week. If your vacation rental has a dock, your fishing days can be just about any length you want.

Rent-It Cons

It’s not all peaches and cream when renting a boat. Here are the disadvantages.

• Renting a boat can be expensive. An Edgewater 320 center-­console rental is $850 at Vacation Boat Rentals. The average daily rate for a 25-footer is around $500 to $600, and the day only lasts eight hours. 
• In Marathon, Coco’s Boat Rentals won’t take a reservation for a single-day rental more than a week in advance, but its rates are lower than most. A 20-foot Sea Pro with a Suzuki 115 is $290 a day.
•  If you are born after January 1, 1988, you will need a Florida Boater Safety Education Card that requires passing an in-person or online class.
• Taking your fishing gear aboard a plane is a royal pain, and when you get there, you may need to buy items, like a net. 
• Fishing on a boat other than your own is more challenging because of the unfamiliarity factor.
• The rental operators can restrict areas you can go, limiting your options.

Peer-to-Peer Rentals

I used to live on Little Torch Key, and on my canal, I estimated that only about 50 percent of the boats ever moved more than a couple of times a year. Owners finally figured out they could be making money on their idle boats. Websites like ­boatsetter.com and getmyboat.com list hundreds of owners in the Keys who will rent their boats to you. The downside is that the standards may vary, as do the prices. Like VRBO house rentals, the devil is in the details, so read everything before renting, and watch out for hidden fees.

How to Save Money

Except for peak times, like the start of the lobster mini season or around Fantasy Fest in Key West, boats will likely be available to rent at the last minute. Private owners and boat-rental locations have little incentive to negotiate on the price months in advance because they know you are a planner and want to lock your boat down. But waiting until the week before or after you get down there changes everything. Like airline seats and hotel rooms, boat owners can never recoup those lost days once they go unfilled. Most rental sites show the days when a boat is available, and if you see large blocks of availability, you have tremendous bargaining power. Don’t be afraid to ask for a substantial discount for a weekly rental. The owner has a choice of getting something or nothing. Most will at least make a counteroffer.

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