A fishing trip in Gozo is a small, quiet affair: a few guests on a local boat, a skipper who has fished the same waters for years, deep water a short run from the coast, and the chance of anything from bream and amberjack on the bottom to lampuki (dorado) in autumn. If you are staying on Malta, plan around the 25 minute ferry from \u010airkewwa to M\u0121arr, book the trip for the day you cross early, and ask the skipper where the boat leaves from before you set off. Your licence is the boat’s job, not yours.<\/p>\n
Gozo is the slower, smaller island, and its fishing trips are the same.<\/strong> Expect a boat for a handful of guests rather than a crowded party boat, a morning start, and a skipper who decides on the day where to fish based on wind and season. The sea floor falls away quickly around Gozo, so you do not lose half the morning running out to deep water. Most trips mix bottom fishing over rocky ground with trolling when fish are moving near the surface, and in late summer and autumn the lampuki season adds a target the whole of Malta waits for.<\/p>\n What a Gozo trip will not be is a polished tourist cruise. You will get wet hands, smell bait and spend some time waiting. That is the point.<\/p>\n If you are staying on Malta, the crossing shapes your day:<\/p>\n Because fishing trips start early, the simplest plan is to stay on Gozo the night before. If that is not possible, tell the skipper which crossing you can make. A captain who knows you are coming off the first ferry can often plan around it, but only if you say so when you book, not on the morning.<\/p>\n Ask exactly where to meet. M\u0121arr is Gozo’s main harbour, but boats also work from smaller bays around the island, and a skipper’s home village is not always where the boat is moored. The Gozo boat on Reelzy<\/a> is listed in Xag\u0127ra, an inland village, so the meeting point is something to confirm in your booking messages.<\/p>\n Gozo boats are usually small. The Reelzy Gozo listing takes up to four guests, and its skipper has fished deep water around the islands for thirty years. A boat that size means everyone gets a rod, the skipper can show you what to do, and nobody is fighting for a place at the rail.<\/p>\n A typical morning runs like this:<\/p>\n If you want something specific, such as only trolling, only light tackle, or a target species, say so when you book. A skipper who knows what you want before the trip can choose the right ground. One who hears it at the dock cannot.<\/p>\n Malta and Gozo share the same seasons, covered month by month in our Malta fishing seasons guide<\/a>. For a Gozo trip, the short version:<\/p>\n Bluefin tuna pass the islands too, and some Malta boats specialise in them, but tuna fishing is tightly regulated. Whether a tuna can be kept depends on the boat’s authorisation and the rules that year, so treat a bluefin trip as a separate booking with a specialist boat rather than a bonus on a general Gozo trip.<\/p>\n Not as a guest on a charter. The boat holds the paperwork. On the Malta boats listed on Reelzy, the skippers handle licences and the rules about what can be kept; the Hooked Malta listing<\/a>, for example, states that guests do not need to buy a fishing licence. If you plan to fish from the shore on your own during the same holiday, that is a different question with its own rules, and worth checking with the Department of Fisheries before you cast.<\/p>\n Usually, within the legal limits, and it is one of the best parts of a trip on a small island. Some Malta skippers clean the catch for you, so bring a cool bag if you are self catering, or ask a local restaurant whether it will cook what you bring in. The details, including species that must go back and size limits, are in our guide to keeping the fish on a Malta charter<\/a>.<\/p>\n If you are staying on Gozo, fish from Gozo. You save the crossing and you get the island’s quieter, more personal style.<\/p>\n If you are staying on Malta and want a Gozo day out, the trip is worth it, but count the ferry and the drive into your morning. If you just want to fish and have no other reason to cross, a boat closer to your hotel saves two or three hours:<\/p>\n All the Malta boats, with their ports and trip types, are on the Malta fishing charters page<\/a>. Families should read our guide to a Malta fishing charter with kids<\/a> before choosing.<\/p>\n A good skipper answers these in a few lines. If the answers are vague, ask again or choose another boat.<\/p>\n Message the Gozo skipper<\/a> with your dates, the number of people and whether you are crossing from Malta. You will have an answer about the meeting point and the plan before you book the ferry, which is the order to do things in.<\/p>\n Cover: "Mgarr Harbour, Gozo"<\/a> by Paul Stephenson, CC BY 2.0<\/a>, edited (colour, retouching).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Planning a fishing trip in Gozo? How to get there from Malta, what a Gozo boat trip is like, the lampuki season, what you can keep and what to ask the skipper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":915,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","rz_lang":"","rz_translation_of":0},"categories":[133,34],"tags":[10,234,143,129,128],"class_list":["post-757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guides","category-malta-fishing","tag-deep-sea-fishing","tag-first-trip","tag-gozo","tag-lampuki","tag-malta"],"translations":[{"lang":"en","id":757,"slug":"fishing-trip-gozo-what-to-expect","link":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/fishing-trip-gozo-what-to-expect\/"},{"lang":"es","id":761,"slug":"salida-de-pesca-en-gozo-que-esperar","link":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/es\/salida-de-pesca-en-gozo-que-esperar\/"},{"lang":"ru","id":760,"slug":"rybalka-na-gozo-chego-ozhidat","link":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/ru\/rybalka-na-gozo-chego-ozhidat\/"},{"lang":"fr","id":762,"slug":"sortie-peche-gozo-a-quoi-s-attendre","link":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/fr\/sortie-peche-gozo-a-quoi-s-attendre\/"},{"lang":"de","id":763,"slug":"angeltour-gozo-was-erwartet-sie","link":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/de\/angeltour-gozo-was-erwartet-sie\/"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=757"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":916,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757\/revisions\/916"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reelzy.co\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Getting to Gozo for an early start<\/h2>\n
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What a Gozo fishing trip is like<\/h2>\n
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What you might catch, and when<\/h2>\n
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Do you need a licence?<\/h2>\n
Can you keep the fish?<\/h2>\n
What to bring<\/h2>\n
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Gozo or Malta: which island to fish from?<\/h2>\n
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Questions to ask the skipper before you book<\/h2>\n
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Ready to go?<\/h2>\n