Frances Fleet

Very helpful crew. Friendly staff. Enjoyable experience was enjoyable, would go on trips again in the future.

Went whale watching on a whim while I was in Rhode Island with my wife.
The whales we found were «Fin Whales» which apparently are not as interested in people as other species. The captain spent extra time though making sure we saw as much of them as we could. The crew were very friendly.
Great way to spend an afternoon.

Do not fish with the Frances Fleet.
They make no effort to get you near the fish and want you to catch little just so you will be back sooner. Its too expensive to be taken for a ride. Watch the boat come after the days fishing and see most people with no fish at all.

We embarked on our whale & dolphin watching adventure in mid July. I gotta say that normally I’m not a big fan of these types of things due to the potential of a low return on the time investment. The first hour and a half was a little brutal, to the point that the captain was repeated apologizing for the low turnout of sea life. At one point I feel asleep laying across the galley seats.
But then out of nowhere we were flanked by a pack of hundreds and hundreds of dolphins, who were elated to see us. We stopped and enjoyed them for a bit, but then the captain explained we needed to keep moving if we were to find any whales. As we took off the dolphins came with us for quite a ways. The captain explained that they like to belly surf off of the waves created by the ship.
After 2 hours and no whales everyone was growing impatient when to our delight we spotted a whale off in the distance and we sped over to go view it. Then there was another and then there was a couple swimming together. By the end of the day we saw a total of 8 whales, which the captain explained were all Fin whales. The captain kept us out a bit longer than advertised because he wanted to make sure we got the full experience. It was a great value for the money and we both enjoyed the adventure.

Awesome day on the 4 hour fluke trip! My fiancé decided he wanted to go fishing for his birthday so we ended up making an online reservation for a 1pm Sunday trip.
The boat we were on holds about 75 people and was only ²⁄₃ full so there was plenty of space. We moved around to a few different spots and at the third spot everyone’s lines were jerking. I think nearly everyone caught as least one fish and we went home with 3 sea bass.
The crew is fantastic and was always nearby to net your catch or help out with any tangled lines. Be sure to bring cash to tip these awesome guys & if you want them to filet up your catch (only $ 2).
We will definitely do this again! My fiancé and I had a blast and it made for a pretty relaxing afternoon.

This was my second attempt at a Whale Watching tour. I understand that nature is unpredictable but I have a feeling no one sees whales on these trips. If you are here for only a week, don’t waste your time. It is hard to give up a nice day when you are staying for one week. The crew was very nice and did seem to be trying really hard.
We did see dolphins on both trips. Also, if you have kids under the age of 6, don’t take them on this trip. You are on the boat for 5hrs and kids cannot run around on the boat obviously. There were a couple of screaming 3 yr olds and it was not fun to be around them.

Big group of us did the night striper fishing. Granted, half of us got seasick (very high seas), but no one caught anything (well, one person got one bluefish). Also, others on the boat did catch some fish, but probably less than 1 fish per person on average. The crew was working hard, and I am sure the captain as well, just go into it with appropriate expectations. Our group paid over $ 1000 collectively and we came up empty handed.
I have been on a cod trip out of Plymouth, similar style, and everyone was reeling in something (whether it be dogfish or otherwise). Came away from that at least having had much more fun than this trip.

Did a winter cod/​seabass trip with these guys in dec 2011. Overall it was a pretty good trip. The mates were a little overwhelmed by the # of tangles in the back of the boat, so they didn’t make it to the front of the boat as often to net/​gaff our fish. They filleted all our seabass. Did an admirable job. A little more attention to the customers than other boats I’d been on, and nothing to complain about. Captn put us on black seabass, which was all I wanted. Did a cod trip spring of 2013. Was a tough day with very few fish biting. Captain tried hard to get fish in the boat and stayed out a couple extra hours, steaming 15 miles further to get some fish in the boat. Words of advice: get there 2 hours before sailing to get good fishing spots, and a seat inside the cabin. They serve food and drinks onboard, but we usually bring sandwiches and stuff.