SEO for fishing website

Hi, Our site [login to view URL] is pretty outdated and needs an overall up-date. We're currently planning on building a new site based on wordpress (the old site is just pure old html). The problem is that the former webmaster and designer of the site is now retired. He also used to do the link-building and SEO for Costa Rica Sportsman. The site used to be up on the first page of google for years (!) but now recently dropped significantly - most likely due to the new google search engine changes, and also because he stopped doing the constant SEO work. We have a freelance webdesigner available who would built a new site, but on wordpress. We would like to keep the site name of course, but then eventually do a "switch" once the new site is ready (built on wordpress) and have a 301 -redirect and just have the new wordpress-based site up and running. The task is to: - get the site up on the first page of google again (now it is on the 4th of US google I think) - help us to do the "switch" from the old site to the new site - preferably without loosing much more rankings - this includes working closely together with the wordpress designer to built the new site and make it overall "SEO" friendly (the wordpress person is not very fit in SEO related matters, but builds beautiful sites) We would like this to happen asap since we're receiving bookings usually around this time of year for the upcoming season. Please send us a list of your past SEO work and a "quote" (how much do you expect to be paid for that job)! Please also let us know what you think about the "switch" in terms of SEO - is it wise to do the switch to wordpress? We've talked to several designers, and it seems that some have a rather bad opinion about wordpress and say the sites wouldn't rank well at all (or that wordpress sites never rank on the first page of google). We'd like an honest opinion on the whole matter and we're happy to work around your thoughts! Thanks.