The Florida Everglades are a million and a half acres of wetland famously called a river of grass. From the water at Flamingo, it’s more of a mangrove jungle. Here at the southernmost outpost of Everglades National Park, tannin-stained fresh water filtered through a hundred miles of swamps meets the salt water expanse of Florida Bay. The scenery is spectacular, and the prevalence of life is astounding.
From the 12-foot American crocodile named Fred, who suns himself on the boat ramp at the marina, to steering around manatees that slurp air in the pre-dawn gloom, to the riotous clamor of hundreds of birds that erupt from mangrove keys on approach for a cast, there is something wild and alive in every direction you look. That includes beneath the water, which was wind-stirred to a chalky green on the flats when we fished in early December.
With a cold front blowing in, the wind ripped out of the north as we steered kayaks from the channel at Flamingo Marina. This first afternoon on Florida Bay was an appetizer followed by two full days of fishing. Conditions would be tough, especially from our rigs, but with a variety of habitats and wind breaks easily in range of the marina docks, “The Glades” around Flamingo are particularly well suited to kayak fishing—especially when those kayaks are pushed by powerful electric motors.
We were well equipped on this Sport Fishing Adventures expedition, riding Bonafide Kayaks with Newport electric motors and testing out new Quantum Myth rods with Strive spinning reels. The four of us set out to fish waters only one of us had ever fished before. The fishing was simple and fun. Throwing mostly soft plastics on jig heads, we hammered away at the mangroves and dredged out the trenches for regular encounters with snook, seatrout, tarpon and redfish. It was a grind at times, but you play the hand you’re dealt when kayak fishing, and the fishing gods reward persistence.
Fishing Motorized Kayaks at Flamingo
That first afternoon on the flats gave us time to get used to the boats. Justin Floyd, of Bonafide Kayaks, met us at Flamingo Lodge trailering well-equipped XTR 130 model kayaks. Three of them were rigged with Newport NK300 stern-drive motors that featured Wizard FCS foot-pedal steering and a throttle knob mounted comfortably at hand on the rail. The fourth Bonafide was equipped with a Newport NT300 tiller steer.
Floyd described Bonafide Kayaks as a new category of boat somewhere between a kayak and a mini skiff. They are sweet rides, built for motorization with the stability for jumping jacks, along with excellent mobility and maneuverability of a small vessel with well-designed steering and propulsion systems. More than a couple of times, boaters idling past in skiffs or pontoons remarked on how cool these little boats were.
Loaded with 350 pounds, they draft just 6 inches, and with a maximum weight capacity of 730 pounds, they can be outfitted to fish two big men. A second seat can be installed quickly on the spacious and stable forward casting deck. The tiller-steer motor would have been perfect for a tandem set-up, but the pedal-steer motors really shined on the flats and along mangrove canals, allowing solo anglers to fish and maneuver hands-free at the same time.
From rod holders to electronics mounts and anchoring systems, there’s a wide variety of accessories to customize Bonafides to your style of fishing. Power Poles came in handy on the windy flats, as did an anchor winch with a drag chain, but Floyd’s kayak, with its bow-mounted, remote-operated trolling motor, was a fishing machine. Watching him ease down a mangrove shoreline standing, casting and steering while watching sonar on a surprisingly large bow-mounted monitor was like watching a tournament pro on the deck of a miniature bass boat. When he got ready to change spots, he pulled the trolling motor and fired up the Newport.
Floyd said Newport’s 3 hp motors push the XTR 130s to about 6.5 mph, which might not sound like much on paper, but it will get you where you’re going much quicker than paddles and with a lot less effort than pedals. It took a little practice to get a feel for the power and a slight throttle-to-motor lag, but within a few minutes we were all zipping around with excellent maneuverability and cruising comfortably at a clip that might have seemed unsafe in a boat not specifically designed for a motor. Newport’s lithium batteries are lightweight at a little over 20 pounds, and with a maximum 30 amp hours, Floyd probably didn’t need to charge them every night, but he did anyway.
Exploring Florida Bay
After a long morning of travel, four of us eagerly spread out with the enthusiasm of kids released for summer break. One by one, we tentatively tested the feel of the boats inside the bay at Flamingo Marina before shooting out on Florida Bay in different directions.
YouTuber Rich Janitschek, of FishAholic Fishing, set out eastward along the mangrove shoreline toward Christian Point, and seeing the wind shade created by the south-facing bank, I followed. Calmer conditions in the channel between the mainland and a small island, Joe Kemp Key, seemed preferable to battling the wind farther offshore.
Brent Schirmer was filming for his YouTube channel, See Ya Dude, and he set out southward to prospect around a few of the little mangrove islands that dot the bay right out front of Flamingo Lodge. He was the one team member who had fished out of Flamingo before. His plan turned out to be a wise one.
At the end of the afternoon, as a glorious sunset settled into the bay between islands on the horizon, the hum of a billion hungry mosquitoes rose from the mangroves. That was our cue to boogie back to the ramp. After dinner and drinks at the lodge’s Flamingo Restaurant, Schirmer held court. Janitschek had saved face with one little jack. Floyd and I got skunked. Schirmer? He found the fish that afternoon. Throwing a paddle tail, he checked an Everglades slam off his list with multiple snook, baby tarpon and a couple nice redfish. He nearly lost his hand to a bull shark that hammered a snook he was reaching to land. Watch your fingers and don’t dawdle while releasing fish on Florida Bay. It’s a good idea to carry a landing net.
Monster Tarpon on the Flats
It was 40 degrees and howling with 20 mph gusts the next morning when we emerged before dawn. In weather hardly stereotypical for sunny South Florida, we donned every stitch of clothing we brought, but there was a silver lining to the cold. The hordes of droning mosquitos from the previous evening were pinned to the wall outside our room, too cold to suck blood. According to the bartender at Flamingo Restaurant (who didn’t tell me about the “order-a-double special” until the last evening of the trip), December is the beginning of the high season at Flamingo, when wildlife watchers need not worry about being carried away by mosquitos.
According to Capt. Ridge Murphy, who met us at the ramp with his Yamaha-powered skiff at sunrise to “herd kayaks like cats,” spring and fall offer the best fishing. Mosquitoes aren’t too much of a problem once you’re out on the water, but the water temps across the shallows get a little warm for the fish in deep summer. We were looking at the opposite scenario, and it played out well because fish were consolidated by sun-warmed water rolling off mud and grass flats with the tide.
“That was probably the coldest day of that front. Those fish are up on the flats incubating themselves because shallow water warms faster,” Capt. Murphy said. “When there’s no water left on the flat, they set up on the edges in the trenches.”
Through a slow early morning spent flipping and pitching lures to the mangroves, Murphy led our gaggle of kayaks like a mama duck a couple miles up the shoreline to the vast flat at Snake Bight. Later, while looking at a map, the channels were obvious veins that carried the pulse of the tide throughout the inches-deep expanse. We were able to get up on the flat with kayaks and a skiff, but we watched in amusement as a bay boat in the marked channel a few hundred yards away threw rooster tails of mud for a half hour trying to get unstuck.
There was some sight fishing success on the flat, but the real action began after falling water forced us out to the intersection of the little vein we were exploring and Snake Bight Channel. “It’s just like anywhere,” Capt. Murphy said. “Find the moving water. Find the deeper water with current, and you’ll find the bait and the fish.”
Schirmer was the first to find the seatrout stacked up at that intersection, and the kayaks lined up along the channel edge, staked out and caught them on paddle tails and a few live shrimp every third cast for maybe an hour until that got boring. Then we dispersed in search of more variety. Floyd discovered a pile of ladyfish and earned himself a new nickname, “ladies man,” as he hauled up one “poor man’s tarpon” after another. I hooked into what would have been the snook of the trip on a pearl white Gulp! Shrimp. It had been sunning itself in a shallow pocket on the edge of the channel, and we got a good look at the 30-plus-incher before it came unbuttoned.
Then all hell broke loose. At first, Janitschek’s shouts were unintelligible, lost in the wind. With a deep bend in his rod, he worked the pedals to straighten his Bonafide as it began creeping forward under fish-power. “Tarpon! Monster tarpon!” his excitement broke through the gusts. On cue, a 100-pounder crashed through the surface and thrashed in vain to throw the hook on the first of several jumps. For the next 45 minutes, Janitschek put the drag on that 4000 Quantum to the test, and it performed. One handed, feathering the throttle to adjust the boat, then pumping and reeling to gain line only to watch it peel back off the reel again and again, Janitschek finally coerced the big ’poon to the surface next to his boat.
As it wallowed for a moment, gaining strength for another run, Janitschek got the leader inside the rod tip several times to make the catch official, before making the ethical decision to clamp down the drag. The fish broke off while it had some life left, concluding a fine piece of fishing that fueled all of us with possibilities for the rest of the afternoon.
Deep in the Everglades Backcountry
Battered by the wind and chop, the team decided to explore inland on the last day of our expedition. The tannin-stained canals and brackish ponds of the backcountry offer a unique fishery where you never know what you might catch.
“It’s not uncommon to catch a bass, a snapper, a redfish and a snook in four casts,” Murphy said. “The inside can be either on or off, though. Consistency with the weather is going to make it better.”
We set off up the canal from the marina and began fishing immediately. Boat traffic was at a minimum because of the weather, and it was downright pleasant easing up a tunnel of mangroves with the Newport in low gear flipping, pitching and skipping to and into visible cover. The Quantum set-ups were balanced, comfortable and well-suited to this style of fishing. Quick, repetitive, short casts with pinpoint accuracy are required to pick apart all that cover efficiently.
I kept 3000 and 4000 Quantums on the deck. Both rods were 7-foot, 6-inches with fast action that shot a 3/8-ounce jig and soft plastic like a cannon. Spooled with 10-pound braid and 25-pound fluorocarbon leader, long casts were handy for covering water on open water. The rigs performed equally well with a finesse approach in the bushes. The Myth rods had the sensitivity to feel your way through timber and tell the difference between a snag and a bite. The Strive reels picked up line smoothly and quickly to keep you in touch with your lure.
Small tarpon—which the trip photographer, Andrew Redwine, dubbed “rich man’s lady fish”—and snook were the predominant quarry in the backcountry. There were also a couple of oddballs. Janitschek caught a gorgeous juvenile Goliath grouper and Floyd caught a football-sized Mayan cichlid which had to be close to the Florida state record.
As we fished maybe 5 miles of canal and open lake up through Coot Bay and into Tarpon Creek, we barely made inroads into the huge, webbed expanse of water to explore in Everglades National Park. We didn’t need to. There were plenty of fish near the ramp.
Fishing out of Flamingo Lodge
Elevated 13 feet off the ground and constructed of steel shipping containers with hurricane windows, the new and improved 24-room Flamingo Lodge opened in 2023 after being shuttered for 18 years due to hurricane damage.
You can camp or rent a canvas tent at Flamingo, but the lodge offers comfortable and spacious rooms and kitchen-equipped suites for people who aren’t interested in roughing it. An on-site restaurant and bar offers good food and libations, and they’ll cook your catch for you. We arranged ahead of time for to-go breakfasts and lunches to carry on the water each day of the trip. They were good and kept us fueled through long days of fishing.
Flamingo Marina offers skiff and houseboat rentals. It has two ramps, one for the backcountry and one for Florida Bay, with courtesy docks on both sides. The marina store has typical convenience-store fare.
A word on trip planning: Flamingo is as deep in the sticks as you can get in South Florida. It’s about an hour’s drive through the marshlands of the park from the nearest town, Homestead. It’s an hour and 40 minutes from the nearest airport in Miami. You might be able to pick up a few essentials you forgot, such as bug spray or sunscreen, from the marina store or the lodge office, but bring what you need, especially when it comes to fishing gear.
