Saturday 18 April 2009

Quitting smoking finally pays off

I've been a smoker for most of my adult life now. I always knew one day I'd give it up but I've dreaded it. I have not been blessed with good willpower at all.
Fortunately i was able to combine two of my major life goals; quit smoking and owning a Hardy demon reel. I have lusted after this reel since it's release two years ago, the only problem being that i couldn't justify owning one, the price of the reel was pretty much the same price as my current whole outfit.
This is where the big quit came in. I had only been dimly aware of the amount i spent on tobacco, for as long as i can remember the cost of my habit was borne as would bare the cost of food, utilities and petrol. Once the connection was made between not smoking and owning this object of desire, the rest was easy.
A couple of months later and I'm now the proud owner of a Hardy Demon Outfit and after a fly fishing packed Easter weekend, the sacrifice has definitely been worth it.

I plumbed for the Hardy demon 9'6'' 7wt rod as i would mainly fish small stillwaters and was looking for a rod that would allow me to cast into a decent headwind and yet still be subtle enough to present a couple of dries. The rod excels at both, i wouldn't be a great caster but the rod is definitely alot more forgiving than my previous Greys GRX one.

The smaller Demon 5000 reel was chosen as i would rarely need to go into the backing and I just thought it looked prettier more balanced. The drag is fantastic and the cartridges are easy to change. the only don side is that a rubber ring is used the cushion between the cartridge and the locking ring and I've almost lost this once already.

I matched the outfit up with a WF floating two tone hardy fly line. This final extravagance was the sweetener on the deal I got from the tackle shop and I'm really pleased with it. There is very little memory, you can easily tell when the running line starts and it picks up off the water brilliant.

So far I've managed to bring it out to two fisheries Woodford and Murloc both times there were active fish near the surface that were responding well to buzzers. The rod and reel have preformed admirably and whilst i struggle to justify the expense I am glad I went the extra distance and bought something i know I'll use and cherish for the next decade or so