Deep Blue Kayak Fishing

Deep Blue Kayak Fishing is a Boynton Beach-based guide service built around two USCG-licensed captains, Matt Eckert and Eric McDonald, who between them have logged years of competitive and guided kayak fishing up and down the Southeast Florida coast. This is not a rental counter where a customer grabs a kayak and figures it out alone. It is a guided experience where the captains bring the kayaks, a Hobie fleet set up specifically for offshore and inshore fishing, along with the gear and the local knowledge of where fish are holding on a given day, and clients fish alongside them.

Matt Eckert moved to South Florida from Buffalo, New York in 2008 and built a reputation in kayak fishing tournament circles, including a well-documented run during the 2014 Extreme Kayak Fishing Tour “Battle in the Bahamas,” when he hooked an estimated 400 to 500 pound blue marlin on spinning tackle from a kayak and fought it for roughly 11 hours. Eric McDonald, originally from Detroit and in Florida since 2007, has a similar reputation locally, having landed what is recorded as the largest kayak-caught yellowfin tuna in Southeast Florida during a solo trip in 2017, and he finished second in the EKFT Saltwater World Championship in 2015. Those credentials matter specifically in kayak fishing, since landing large offshore species from a kayak calls for a different skill set than doing it from a center console.

The trip menu is broad. Offshore kayak fishing and dedicated sailfish charters sit alongside inshore trips for snook and tarpon, a hybrid offshore-and-tarpon option, and beach and inlet tarpon trips for anglers who want to sight-fish close to shore. The guides also run freshwater trips for peacock bass and clown knife fish, Florida fly fishing charters, multi-day week trip packages, and a junior fishing summer camp aimed at introducing kids to the sport. Across all of these, the company runs somewhere around 350 guided trips a year, a meaningful volume for a two-guide operation that points to a steady, repeat client base rather than a seasonal side business.

The company is based in Boynton Beach, and the guides will run trips as far south as Delray Beach and as far north as Jupiter depending on where fish are biting and what a client is after. They have also recently added conventional boat charters alongside the kayak trips. Because this is a small, guide-driven operation rather than a storefront with walk-in rentals, booking happens through a request form, phone, or text, with the guides typically responding within 24 hours to work out timing, location, and species.

That flexibility is part of the appeal for anglers who want a specific kind of trip, a shot at a big tarpon from the beach, say, or a freshwater peacock bass outing on one of the county’s canal systems, rather than a generic charter. Pricing and exact meeting points vary by trip type and are worked out directly with the guides during booking rather than posted as a flat rate, so anyone interested should reach out ahead of time to confirm the details for the specific trip they have in mind.