I bought my 1995, 16-foot Hewes Bonefisher in 2014. I always had an affinity for these skiffs, with their lapstrake hulls and beautiful lines, but the boat was in terrible shape when I got it. There were so many leaves in the cockpit that they had broken down and turned into dirt. Plants were living inside the boat.

The Bonefisher was a total restoration project that the seller never started. I think his wife wanted it out of the yard, so I got the boat, motor and trailer for $400. The engine was a 90-hp, 2-stroke Yamaha, which was pretty bulletproof. I cleaned it up, repainted the cowling and ran it for a year. After that, I switched to a Mercury 115-hp 4-stroke.

The hull was designed around the 90, which weighs 110 pounds less than the Mercury, but it runs great. It’s a 55-mph boat, but it doesn’t draft like a technical poling skiff. It wasn’t really designed for that. Truthfully, I never pole the boat. It’s not super shallow where I fish, so I bump around with the trolling motor and drift.

My son Fin was born a few months before I got the boat, and as a photographer, my goal was to use the Hewes for photo and video shoots, but it also has become a great family boat. I named it Fintastic after my son. I’ve used the boat as a model in multiple ads and videos for my clients. It’s so small that it’s really easy to trailer, and it can get into all kinds of spots, like the Everglades and Mosquito Lagoon. My work takes me all over, and I mostly use my Hewes as a shooting platform or a chase boat.

The 16-foot Hewes Bonefisher is powered by a 115-hp Mercury and the Minn Kota Terrova trolling motor on the bow is ideal for shallow-water fishing.

Fintastic was so oxidized when I got it that I thought the hull was white. When I started to wet-sand, I realized the color was actually ice blue. The older Hewes skiffs have a thick gelcoat. I buffed it and buffed it, and the color came back, and then I redid the nonskid. I ended up stripping the boat to the bare bones. I don’t think there is an original screw or wire in the entire skiff. Luckily, the gas tank was immaculate, so we didn’t have to replace it. That was a bonus.

The boat is so well-built that I haven’t had any issues with a soft deck or wet transom. There are zero soft spots. A few years ago, I was in an accident while trailering Fintastic. I got rear-ended, and it damaged my trailer but did nothing to the structure of the boat.

I do a lot of work with Johnson Outdoors, and the company helped me dial in the electronics and trolling motor. I have a 13-inch Humminbird Apex plotter and a Minn Kota Terrova trolling motor that are networked together.

For a small boat, she has plenty of storage for camera gear and fishing tackle. I have it set up so I can do almost any kind of photo shoot, from bass fishing to inshore and offshore stuff. And when I’m shooting underwater, I can slide back on deck from the transom, where the freeboard is like two inches.

Bob Hewes started it all when it comes to poling skiffs. It’s kind of cool that all of that originated from skiffs like mine. I get a lot of comments about the boat. I can’t go to a gas station without somebody wanting to talk to me about my skiff.

It’s fishy, too. During a full-moon tide, we caught probably 150 redfish in an area about the size of a backyard swimming pool. The fish were stuck in this hole and ate anything we threw at them. That was a fun day, fishing this little moat between two islands.