Afishionado Guide Services — Local services in Tampa

If you're fishing in the Tampa Bay area, you simply can't go wrong booking Wade.

A lot of guides will say they specialize in fly fishing and light tackle. Wade brings the goods. He understands how to position the boat based on the skill of the caster. I'm not an expert fly-flinger but I'm not bad either. Wade watched me, figured out where my comfort zone is, adjusted his positioning and set me up for success all while coaching and tending to a less experienced angler in the boat. How he juggled it all I'm not sure, but it is obvious he has the experience and expertise that makes for a great guide.

Bottom line, Wade does everything a great guide should do: He puts you on fish consistently. He gives you the best opportunity to hook them and he does it every minute you are on his boat. He coaches with a steady, reasonable voice and talks the fish up to the gunwale. He's easy to get along with.

I've fished with guides who take time in the first hour catching bait. Some will add that time to the trip and some will start the clock when they leave the dock. Wade showed up at the dock both days on time with the live well full so we didn't waste time or daylight netting snacks for the predators. When you book a trip for a specified period of time, that's what you get, no BS and no time wasted. During a total of 12 hours of booked trip, I fished almost 10 of them and caught fish at every spot but one. We didn't stay there long. Time spent moving from spot to spot to follow the tides are part of the deal and Wade even keeps that to a minimum by planning his routes well. By the end of each day, we had a 10 minute trip from last cast to the dock.

For me, personally, his dedication to conserving the resource and treating the fish with respect only added the the day.

I can't say enough about Wade, his skill and his work ethic. If my experience with him doesn't make you want to book a trip, sell your rods and find...

Unfortunately this was the worst fishing trip we have ever been on. Did we catch fish? Yes. But was Wade a complete and total jerk? Also yes. Multiple times he had my 12 year old & mother in law almost in tears because they weren't holding their rods up high enough for him to grab the hook. He had a horrible personality and made it a horrible trip. He was a complete control freak on making sure our locations were turned off and not wanting us to take the pictures, that only he would and then send them to us, which he did. We have been on other boats with other guides and never had such a horrible experience. Wade doesn't seem like he even likes doing this, so he really should stop! We should've had him take us back and thrown our money in the ocean and felt better about that. He arrived to pick us up and his boat was really dirty, which we understand that happens from being out and catching bait. But don't get mad at me for not wiping my feet "properly" and be worried about me stepping on your already dirty boat and making it "dirty". Also he got mad at my son and husband for stepping on the dock on dried bird poop and then having to get on his boat. Ridiculous since his boat already had bird poop on it and dead bait on the floor! Do not and I repeat do not book with him! I do not write this review lightly and understand this is his livelihood, but he should really stop! We pay good money to have a good time and enjoy being out on the water catching fish. I have never had such a horrible and hostile time while fishing! Multiple times I wanted to fake sick to make him turn around and...

I've used many fishing guides through out Central and North America and hands down Afishionados has been by far the best. We were a group of 5, 2 Adults and 3 kids. I was the only one in the group with a lot of fishing experience, but it didn't matter. Captain Wade made it so easy and fun to fish that my young niece and nephew, who had no fishing experience, had an amazing time. All the other guides that I have hired have had a first mate helping them, so when I saw that Captain Wade was working by himself, I mentally prepare myself and the kids to have a lot of down time, but I was pleasantly surprised that this was not the case. Captain Wade's system for baiting your hook was so efficient that you spend almost all of your time with your line in the water, which equates to catching more fish. I caught more keepers on this trip than I did in my last 3 trips combined. Also, Captain Wade is a trained photographer and it shows in the quality of the pictures he took. He takes care of taking all the pictures, so that you don't miss out in capturing the great memories. I can't wait until I'm in the Tampa area again so that I can hire Captain Wade of Afishionados to take me on another amazing...