A view from the top.....at a different spot...

What I liked about rod:

1) Fits in a rod tube - thats fits diagonally into a large suitcase

2) Casts a range of weights really well from 65 gram metal jigs and still capble of lobbing out 200 gram river 2 -sea and williamson poopers, also tried stick bait with it around 90 grams -and also fished that reasonably well.

3) Pretty solid rod -loads up fast on fish.  Would stick to line rating suggested -we used PE 5 and PE 2 -both worked rod well.  Probably more suited to PE 4 to 5 -but was still handy for lighter work in the lagoons.

Dislikes:

1) Not a major but aluminium alps style reel seat -needs to be thoroughly tightened and kept an eye on during casting session -as reel seat can work loose.

 

Thats it really, will put some photos from trip up once wife downloads from camera and mate with me sends some through some from his -we have some spectacular photos of some of ledges fished and what large waves do when smashing into them.

Did hook one large GT on seaward side of Vava'u with rod - unfortuntely a rather shortlived battle and it broke me off in short order.  I had been using PE 2 to get a bit of distance with a light crome jig -suggested by "Tehau" - our guide.  Crome jig he suggested (halco wobbler) certainly worked but my choice of line weight left me undergunned.

 

Anyway will know next time to respect the fish (not use silly string).  Also saw a couple of decent GTs and bluefins swimming round wharf at Mystic sands -but these were specially trained fish that would only appear when you didn't have rod handy.

Some interesting light top water stuff available in Vavau harbour lagoons -small baracuda and longtom and trevally present.  Again small crome jigs seemed to be go there.

 

Anyway currently working on post on the outstanding gamefishing we had...

Now I just have to decide what reel to take with it -either my 4500 Diawa Opus Bull with spare spool, carrying PE3 and PE50.  Or my Finor 7500 spooled with PE5.  The diawa is lighter and nice to cast- but the Finor is a bit more grunty.  But I only want to take one reel -so one will be staying at home -and the diawa with its extra spool seems favourite at this stage.  

Main purpose of trip is actually to gamefish on Target One for few days, but last time I was there on quite a few of occassions we had schools of what looked like small to medium GTs cruising round where we were staying and smashing bait right in the shallows early in morning and in the evening. I also recall getting very close to big school of YFT while out game fisihing that potentially one could have flicked a stickbait into. 

Hopefully will be able to give you a report on how the new rod went on about 20th August.

 

i did not catch a fish on it, another guy i was with did catch a few, so it looked strong enough, but not a rod that i liked, i am not a fan and would not buy one personally. just my opinion though.