Beulah Blue Water 8/9 wt Fly Rod

A quality blue corduroy tube with internal black cloth bag keep the Beulah's Blue Water 8/9 wt fly rod safe. Sliding the blank from the cloth bag reveals a beautiful gloss blue IM8 blank in three equal parts, eight oversize snake guides and two lined stripping guides are whipped with navy thread the stripping guides embellished with twin silver thread hoops, it's great to see the varnish has been applied with care, so often rods are ruined by sloppy varnish work. There is no hook keeper.

   The complete package.

The real stand out fitting on this rod is the composite cork handle, a crafted multi-section fighting butt nice, but not unusual, the main handle though is very different a high grade cork wells handle with extended composite hardwearing fighting grip, the design is striking and provokes a conversation whenever we used it, which I have to admit was rather a lot.

The beautiful cork/composite handle with fighting grip.

The heavy duty saltwater proof reel seat completes the set up.

We chose to fish the rod with an 8 wt Cortland 444 SL Ghost Tip, a floating intermediate line which we use on our own 8 wt rod.

Out on the kayak, the rod was quick to load, and throw a long line, this is one stiff rod, classed as Damn Fast Action in Beulah's specs. Should you get it wrong, lifting the line off the surface and recasting is done with little effort. The only problem we had fishing from the kayak was the length of the fighting butt, this may have been down to our style of casting, but the line would wrap itself around the butt occasionally, this problem was not repeated when fishing from the shore.

   The long fighting butt.

Using this rod over extended periods does take its toll on your body, you can feel every muscle used to shoot a line the day after your fishing trip; obviously this can be a very happy reminder if the day was particularly good.

During the time we used the Beulah the spigot joints showed no sign of loosening, so often joints work their way loose, the reel seat which was checked regularly showed no signs of working loose, the seat is designed to accommodate a larger reel foot than the Orvis Mach IV reel that we used and the reel would need aligning before the twin locking screw was tightened, on occasion the screws proved to work so well it was difficult to loosen to remove the reel.

Fish-on, well the Blue Water doesn't make the best of school size Bass, in fact they will hardly put a bend in the rod, but should you be gunning for something a little bigger then the Beulah won't let you down, we had a couple of surprise wrasse fall to the Blue Water and they both gave a good account of themselves producing a pleasing bend in the rod, for those that haven't hooked a wrasse on the fly, they are a very worthy apponent. Given time we would have liked to have tried a sinking line for some deep water Pollack fishing, but time and conditions were against us. The Blue Water 8/9 wt makes a great fly rod for Pike fishing, more than capable of punching large pike flies through the wind.

A pair of wrasse caught on the fly.

If your looking for an 8/9 wt for Bass, Pollack or Pike fishing from shore or kayak then try and get hold of a demo rod, beginners will be able to cast surprisingly well and experts will love its fast action.

Something worth considering when purchasing a rod, should you have an accident and break a section what is the procedure for returns, all Beulah returns are to the UK, so no long delays in getting back on the water.

Give Beulah a call on 01420 489111 for your nearest dealer, mention AnglersAfloat and you might even get a discount!