What to Write Down After Every Trip
I wrote "Log the Trip, Not Just the Fish" and laid out five things worth writing down after a charter. Good advice is easy to agree with and easy to never actually do, even for the guy who wrote it. Here's the actual template I use, three of my own filled-out logs so you can see what "enough detail" looks like, and an honest answer on where I keep it.
The template I actually use
This is what goes down at the dock, five lines, nothing more:
Trip log
- Contact
- Phone or email, whichever they'll actually check
- Catch
- What they were after, what they caught, how the day went
- Party
- Who they were with, what kind of trip it was
- Notes
- Anything that makes the next trip smoother
- Found you
- Google, a friend, a marina sign, FishingBooker
Copy it. Screenshot it. Put it in whatever you're already using.
Five lines. Ten minutes at the dock. That's the whole system.
Three example logs, similar to the ones I have in my log:
Trip log — the kid's first offshore trip
- Contact
- Marcus Trindle, email — hard to reach by phone during the week
- Catch
- Dolphin, limited out, kid caught his first one at 9 years old
- Party
- Dad and son, kid's first time offshore
- Notes
- Ran a shorter day than booked. Kid was gassed by 1pm, and dad appreciated calling it early instead of pushing through
- Found you
- Referral, his coworker (Jeff Smith) who fished last spring
Trip log — the soccer team trip
- Contact
- T. Lasso, cell — texts back fast, doesn't check email
- Catch
- Wanted a shot at a tarpon, caught 5 snook instead
- Party
- Came with some soccer players. Four people. Everyone's first time on a charter.
- Notes
- Old guy gets seasick past the inlet. Stayed inshore the whole day and it worked out fine
- Found you
- Google search, "tarpon charter" plus the inlet name
Trip log — the work outing
- Contact
- Sammy Adams, email only — books through his assistant most of the time
- Catch
- Bottom fishing, mixed bag, nobody cared much what they caught
- Party
- Six-person office trip, half had never held a rod
- Notes
- Book the bigger boat next time. Six plus gear ran tight, and two got sick. Keep seasick meds on hand
- Found you
- FishingBooker, first booking.
The fish count isn't what matters here. "Gets seasick past the inlet." "Appreciated calling it early." "Book the bigger boat next time." Lines like that are what made the second trip with each of these people better than the first. They're also the first thing I forget without writing them down.
Where I actually keep mine
Honest answer: I haven't found anything that works perfectly for this. Charter booking platforms bury customer records somewhere in their CRM screens. They're built around managing the booking, not a captain's notes jotted down at the boat ramp. Big CRMs are built for someone chasing leads through a sales pipeline, not a captain writing "kid gets gassed by 1pm."
So use what you've already got:
- A notebook, if that's genuinely what you'll use. But it needs to survive a season, not just today.
- Notes app with cloud sync turned on. Phones get dropped in the ocean. Check that it's actually syncing before you trust it.
- A shared Google Sheet or Google Contacts note. Free, syncs to your phone automatically, survives an ocean-drop or an upgrade because it was never sitting on the phone in the first place.
- Email to yourself. A last ditch trick that can work in a pinch.
The tool matters less than whether it survives a dropped phone and outlives whoever's on deck with you. Pick the one you'll actually open in March.