I do like a good read and Flatswalker is pretty much that.
What wasn’t perfect was the weather. Andros was under the same weather system as the Florida Keys we’d just left. Upon arrival we rigged rods and checked leaders while Charlie mixed drinks and regaled us with stories of monster bones, massive schools, and, well, everything we’d dreamed of for months. We went to bed early dreaming of giant bonefish and worrying about the weather, both with good cause.
Check out the full story here.
UPDATE (4/17/2012) – Yup… still running the 70% Off Sale, which does not appear to have ever ended. The EXT is still $238.50.
UPDATE (4/18/2012) – They are running a sale right now that actually looks like a sale. $238.50, which is really way down from the $358-$430 numbers with $795 seeming to be steady as the MSRP.
UPDATE (3/26/2012) – March Madness Sale… The EXT continues to have an MSRP of $795, but now is back to $358.50. This means this actually IS a sale of -$80.
UPDATE (3/2/2012) – They’ve changed their tune a bit. Now they say the MSRP is $795. Oddly, the old price, for the $1,195 rod was $358. Now, with the lower MSRP it is now $430. (I think they’ve also unsubscribed me from their marketing emails)
UPDATE… Super Bowl Sunday and I get an email from Albright. 70% off… Free Shipping… Sounds familiar.
So… is the EXT from Albright the most expensive 8 wt. in the world? Well, depends on how you look at their numbers. See, the MSRP is $1,195.00. Um… that would be the the priciest 8 wt. on the planet (by $300+).
The NRX =$760
The Sage One =$730
Winston iiix = $810
Orvis Helios = $825
Well… that just sounds a bit crazy, no?
Don’t worry though… they aren’t selling the EXT for $1,195. You can get it for the low, low price of $358.50. Yup… 70% off the MSRP.
Here’s the thing… that rod has never sold for a grand. Never. It never will. It doesn’t mean it’s a bad rod, but it isn’t a thousand dollar rod.
I have an Albright. It is a decent stick. It was very good in terms of price. I think it was about $90 and it casts like a $130 rod. It’s a deal. The question Albright needs to answer is if the rod is money for value at $358. It might be that. There is a good chance it is. They don’t need to say it casts well for $1,000 because there is no 8 wt. that should cost $1,000.
Come on folks. Play it straight.
(I’m not the only one who has noticed, it seems. Hatch Magazine has as well.)
I’ve spent a few hours talking to Steve on the phone. He’s a guy I like and respect. He’s doing some good things at Orvis, not least of which is the Helios Rod and Mirage Reel series. Here’s a video about the Mirage.
[vimeo clip_id=”28854639″]
PS – saw this over at Flatswalker.
OK… when you are fishing on a boat you see the fish from further away and are making longer casts. Stiffer rods respond well here with longer casts, but if you happen to see the fish in close, you sometimes have trouble getting these faster rods to load well at shorter distances.
On foot you tend to see the fish in closer, making shorter casts… maybe more in the 30-50′ range. Getting your super fast action rod to load at 40′ is sometimes a little difficult and so many anglers up-line for wade fishing. Typical bonefish lines are .25-.5 weights above the line weight anyway, so some folks move to a redfish line, which is .25-.5 heavier still.
Here’s a thought… what if you used a SLOWER action rod for wade fishing? Slower rods (I’m talking medium action here, not a dry fly rod) load better at short distances.
Might a medium action rod actually be better on foot???
I found this little tidbit at Orvis by Jim Lepage and Marshall Cutchin…
In the second situation you are looking for a rod to take bonefishing. You know these fish are strong and fast, that they can get up to 10 pounds in weight and can attain speeds up to 30 miles-per-hour, and that you’ll have to contend with wind while you are casting. The flies you will be using range from size 2 to 6, and they may have some weight added to them. All this means you should look at a rod with a butt section stiff enough to quickly land these fish and a flex profile that puts most of the bend in the tip to mid-section. A rod that flexes in the tip is often referred to as a ‘tip flex,’ or ‘tippy,’ or ‘fast action’. These rods flex progressively toward the mid-section as more and more line is cast. You’ll also want a rod that is on the high side of the “load range” — casting better with 20 to 30 feet of line out of the rod tip than your typical “slow” rod will. In this situation an 8- or 9-weight rod is a perfect match.
Softer, or “slower,” rods allow the caster to feel the loading of the rod more quickly, with less line out of the rod tip. Long casts, on the other hand, tend to benefit from having more line out of the rod tip (there’s more weight to throw), and a stiff rod makes holding more line in the air easier.
From Orvis.
Found by Flatswalker… good points here!
Yeah… just a gentle reminder…
http://youtu.be/SfbGI3DuFrI
Let’s keep those fish swiming.
Coach Duff and a big Hawaii bone. There aren’t a lot of fish there, but the fish that are there are beeg.
Found a story about fishing T&C… a DIY venture with a little bit of success.
T&C seems to have some of the most expensive guides anywhere.
Yeah… Nonouti… I had to look it up. Nanouti is part of Kiribati and a part of the Gilbert Islands.
A little about the fishing…
That doesn’t look totally like my kind of fishing.
This looks a bit better.
Worth a read over at the Costa Del Mar blog “The Watery Rave.”
I hadn’t been over there in a while. Looking good… looking really good.
This from an epic story about traveling down to MX in a veggie oil powered van to convert the locals and find fish.
We first thought that the U-joints were bad, but eventually determined that we broke the transmission mount and that the entire driveline was getting torqued upward. Mexican’s are very resourceful people and at a small repair shop in Cabo they were able to find our exact part within 30 minutes and had it installed in no time flat, which prevented Chris from having to tolerate the local dog population.
