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I recently booked a fishing trip through The Palms. I was deciding between a friend's father-in-law and the "legendary" guide spoken of by the staff member at Palms. The hotel staff talked me into it by saying specifically that the guide they use is an older gentleman, and one of the only people left on the island that fishes for a living. (although he also guides??)

Our guide was not the one who we booked. The guy on our activity voucher and the one spoke so highly of was Guerrero. It was raining the day we booked and our guide said it was going to do this all day. I asked him if he could come back in an hour and he said we will do it tomorrow. Sure enough the storm passed in about an hour and it was beautiful for the rest of the day.

The next day he showed up complaining about how hot it was, but we luckily didn't push it back another day. We went to catch bait fish but after a half-hour or more we were unsuccessful. One of the twenty other guides in the spot had to give us bait fish so that we could begin our fishing trip.

We had three rods in the boat. On one of the rods the real was completely broken (the actual metal housing) so then we had two (It was broken before we even started). The drag wasn't set right on my wife's rod so on the first hook-up with a fish, all the line was ran out by a fish. The guide didn't have any extra line in the boat. Obviously, one would think a fishing guide would have at least one extra spool of line in the boat, but ours didn't. He tried to run the line from the broken rod to the rod without line (which is pretty easy to do, I have done it many times), but he didn't do it correctly so now there was a huge tangle of line on my wife's reel. This caused the rod not to function correctly to where we couldn't even cast it. The guide had to attempt to cast it and was successful on about one of every three attempts. When it did cast it would stop abruptly (because of the enormous knots) and fall about five feet from the boat.

I was told that the guides would clean the fish so that a restaurant could cook it. I asked our guide about this and he said that he guessed he could give us some. I thought it was the other way around. He would clean a fish, and after each one ask rudely if we wanted another.

I don't even know if this guide was an actual guide. He was not wearing "guide" clothes like all the other ones we saw that day fishing the reef. I believe the person we booked pays other people to take his clients out. The Palms did not notify us of this. Upon questioning the staff, they said this was because the guy we originally booked with was already booked. If this was the case, I would have chosen to fish with a different person, and would have booked my friend's father-in-law. However, I don't think this was the case because we went fishing on Tuesday instead of Monday because of the rain and the staff knew this.


As if this wasn't enough our guide brought his seventeen year old cousin with him who was hungover. They spoke to each other in Spanish the entire time (even both spoke perfect English), and didn't speak to us at all. I went fishing to fish, but it would have been nice for our guide to talk to us. I tried asking about different kinds of fish but got nothing.

It seems The Palms has no idea who or what goes on with the company it books through. This company was booked because of the false details provided by the staff. I have gotten mostly blank stares, and an offer of a 10% discount from the fishing company because of this. The staff also continued to blame the fishing company. At least the fishing company has admitted some fault. I typed a version of this story and gave it to The Palms while we were in Belize. I was told the manager would speak to me but they never did. I left all of my contact information and asked for the management to please contact me but so far no one has. I can guarantee if you took your family on this same fishing trip you would agree. It wasn't about the money. In fact, I was paying my bill a few days in and the girl forgot to add my hammock rental so I told her about it so that she could add it. Again, I was paying the rest of my bill on the last day and they forgot to add a snorkeling trip for two so I went down to the office and added this as well.

HOWEVER - everything else was awesome. All other guides and restaurant staff were completely professional and personable. We went snorkeling and diving and everybody was great. I will be posting a trip report shortly.
Was your guide name Gus?
Very unusual. The Palms usually books excellent tours and guides, and is a very well run establishment. I have personally taken many recommendations from the staff there, and have never had any complaints like this from any clients I have sent there. Weird! I'll see what I can find out.
Mr Montgomery,
I received your letter and contact information yesterday from my staff and sent you an email yesterday apologizing for your inconvenience during your stay. We only use the best tour guides and in the email I also said I would find out how this happened and report back to you. I will send you a private message through this message board to be sure I have the correct address.
The Palms Management
this post is so not sanpedro I am truly sorry for you ...I know four or five guides that if they could read this post would scream no way this happened ..the price you pay for a great local guide and a pick up nobody capt.is the same!!!!!!!!!!!!! so .try to pick a name who people know.I fish here almost once a month and use great 5 great fishing capt.. they all have with new equpt ,and new tackel and clean nice boats..if they are all booked I do not go.the story above is not usual but the palms folks who I know would never do this to a customer, they are sooooooooooo professional and have a great track record here..you had to have a once in a blue moon screw up and trust me they are just as mad at what happen as you are.....
Posted By: Anonymous Re: The Palms - don't book fishing through them - 06/14/06 03:54 PM
People - PLEASE contact your hotel with your concerns at the time, and in any case BEFORE making a public critical posting. The Palms has a superb reputation, and slating them publicly for something that (evidently in this case) went wrong is simply unfair.
You can't please all of the people all of the time. But I have to admit, back when I was in my early 20's I thought everything in life was great, even if things didn't go as expected..... I guess kids today expect more, better, faster, bigger, cheaper! wink
Posted By: Gela Re: The Palms - don't book fishing through them - 06/14/06 08:48 PM
Sounds like Montgomery did attempt to contact management and is now hearing back from them. I hope the outcome is satisfactory for all.

I appreciate hearing these experiences - it helps me understand and also be prepared to ask the important questions if I ever do go on a fishing trip.
Captjeff- hey Capt. Hoping to do some tarpon Catching, anyway could you hook me up with good guides? i plan on talking to a certian Internet cafe owner also, but more knowledge never hurts. Thanx cool
The Palms has known about this since about 5 minutes after it happened last Tuesday. I was at their hotel until Sunday (that is six days the management could have spoken to me in person). They have all of my contact information. I was contacted through private message by them yesterday and got my first email this afternoon.
amanda syme-

Im not sure what you are saying. I was very pleased with every other guide in Belize. If bigger, faster, better means having two working rods and reels for two people then I guess you are right.
Glad to know you had a great experience with all of the other guides in Belize.

We do aim to please.

Hopefully you will enjoy your next visit to our wonderful country.
Posted By: Anonymous Re: The Palms - don't book fishing through them - 06/15/06 01:39 AM
amanda syme-
"I guess kids today expect more, better, faster, bigger, cheaper!" ????? HUH????????????
No, they expect to get what they pay for!
Guess one might want to pick real estate agents very, very carefully? Not an attitude I would want to hear from my agent! frown
Everything has been resolved to satifaction with The Palms. I said this before, but this was the only thing I had a problem with during our 10 day stay. Besides this incident The Palms was great. Apparently Amanda Syme can't read because I never said I did not enjoy my visit. I did not enjoy my fishing trip. You are weird
Go snorkeling/diving. Let the fish live... Eat beef! or chicken if you have to??? :-(
Tim, your callous attitude towards animals shocks me. Why, you probably even prefer veal.
The only others that come close to rivaling your heartlessness are the vegetarian. Can you believe all of the natural habitat that cute cuddly animals need to survive that is destroyed just so the vegetarians can grow vegetable to satisfy their cravings. It is unfortunate that cannibalism is such a "dying" culinary endeavor.
Posted By: Anonymous Re: The Palms - don't book fishing through them - 06/15/06 01:38 PM
Tim, I am not shocked at all - sounds just like you! wink
Posted By: Anonymous Re: The Palms - don't book fishing through them - 06/15/06 05:19 PM
And cabbages have feelings too.
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