An object unearthed in the garage of the grandfather!
Son of a fisherman, himself son of a fisherman, I have the chance to continue to share my passion with them from time to time. During a conversation about fly fishing, my grandfather told me about a split bamboo rod he used many years ago, which must be somewhere in his garage, among other fishing relics.
Without a second thought, we go in search of this cane that I imagined as a real nugget. After having turned over half of the bundle, the cane finally appears and its state is quite dilapidated! The remaining rings are completely rusted, the cork handle is in tatters and the ligatures are almost all blown...
My grandfather gave it to me and told me that if I could do something with it and I had a use for it, I could keep it. Not being a great fly fisherman, but an amateur who appreciates this technique enormously, I already own several rods that I have assembled myself adapted to fishing in the rivers and lakes of Corsica where I fish.
But the idea of completely redoing this one and having him catch a few fish sounds like a sentimental commitment to my grandfather.
A complete dismantling
The first step was to completely dismantle the rod to keep only the blank, the rest being unusable and too damaged. It is thus with the greatest of care that I took the time to delicately cut the ligatures to take out the rings, and to scrape the remains of varnish to make the blank homogeneous and pretty.
Then I started to dismantle the cork handle which did not even have a reel seat, that's how rustic the rod is. The junction between the two rods is made of brass that I sanded gently to give it a better aspect.
Make way for rebirth!
Once the blank is perfectly exposed, it's time to select the components to make a new rod on Rodhouse, the European rodbuilding specialist.
After having hesitated for a long time with a very sober setup, I finally decided to combine the vintage and atypical side of bamboo with the modernity of carbon. So I opted for a carbon handle with a wood and Alu reel seat, a pack of classic Alps Fly rings and a spool of brown line for tying.
Adjustment, installation and gluing of the handle and reel seat.
Painting of the brass parts of the drive shaft.
Binding of the rings in brown with a fluorescent orange border to bring a little color.
Varnishing of the ligatures with Gen 4 varnish.
After several hours of drying, the cane is like new and ready to whip!
First session with this new rod
During a fishing trip in a mountain lake, I had the pleasure to test this rod on brook trout which were very active that day. It was enough to catch many fish with this updated jewel!
The short rod length, coupled with my lack of casting practice didn't allow me to cast very far, but the char were mostly on the edges feeding on ants, which made for a fun session!
The sensations offered by this rod are completely different from what you can feel with a modern rod with a carbon blank. But the satisfaction of bringing this rod back to life, and taking it to tease fish in places it has already seen decades ago is incomparable. And the pride in a grandfather's eyes when he looks at the pictures of his grandson with THEIR rod, is unparalleled!
