Paul Arden | Tuesday, 1 April 2025
I had a fun week last week with Ben from
Hong Kong. We had three days Snakehead fishing where Ben landed two adults. Ben also had a few shots at Gourami. After that we headed up Sungai Tiang for the Mahseer. Unfortunately we were extremely unlucky with the weather and evening thunderstorms blew out the river and it didn’t clear until late afternoon the next day and even then not fully. Consequently there was a lot more instructional time than there was successful fishing. Ben had a great time despite the conditions and plans to return.
At this time of year it shouldn’t rain at all. I’m not sure what that’s all about!
This week I’m exceptionally busy with rod sales, trying to get the new website format up and running, I want to employ Lena shortly to help with admin, and it’s summer time in the exciting USA – so I’ll be very busy coaching flycasting via Zoom again. It’s all go!
Also this week I’m putting up Sexyloops HT rod prices. This is for a number of reasons: I need to employ an assistant, costs have increased, we now ship via courier and standard courier service charge is included in the retail price, we now make a rod where we can send out replacement sections without having the rod returned back to us. This saves you money, but costs us more to manufacture. We make the best damned fly rods on the planet, possibly the Universe. Just thought I’d add that one! And finally, I need to buy the Sexyloops Sixty-Six Six yacht, where everyone gets a chance to win a two week trip fly fishing pirate holiday with me. If we don’t make enough money then the yacht will be small, uncomfortable and there will be nowhere to mount the cannon.
So just letting you know. If you are thinking about a new SL rod then ordering now, today, will save you 200USD. And we will still give you a competition entry, and a Zoom flycasting lesson too of course. It’s a pretty significant price hike I know, but that’s because we haven’t put the prices up for a while because I’ve been fishing.
Here in Makaysia it’s Hari Raya. Selamat Hari Raya to all my Malay friends! This of course is a big holiday, where the entire country decides to relocate to a completely different part of the county travelling at about 20km/h. I’ve stocked the Battleship with a week of petrol, water, food and booze supplies, and I’m heading somewhere remote for the week and not going anywhere near a road!
I’m looking forward to a bit of me time. Some fishing. Catching up with Sexyloops. And training again. A couple of 12km runs over the past two days. But that’s me just getting back into things. I’ll train 13-15 hrs this week. That’s me back in the full swing. Up in Sungai Tiang Garmin told me I was “detraining”. It’s difficult to see how climbing over rocks and swimming across rivers is detraining.
Life is great!
Email me if you are interested in a new rod. We have 9 rods on the builds list currently. So there is a small waiting list. Although we do have stock of a 7WT Instructor rod and an HT7 ready to ship to anyone ordering these as standard builds. We can express courier to US (for example) for an extra $30 which takes about two days door to door as opposed to the normal 5-6 days. Exciting times we live in.
Great page from Kalyn yesterday!! Kalyn WhatsApp’d me last week asking for my thoughts on the subject. My thoughtful reply was:
“For me:
Fly fishing is fishing an artificial fly. It can be on mono, under a bubble float, trolled on a lead line. I don’t care.
Artificial fly is anything I can make myself. Now this gets complicated. Because if it’s a rubber silicone body that’s prefabricated then it’s not a fly, but if I make it by cutting up a bike tube then it’s ok.
I’m not sure where propellers fit into this (yours haven’t arrived yet by the way!) but I’m not going to think too deeply about where they fit into my definition either!
I don’t think scenting your fly with fish oil, armorall or used panties counts as fly fishing. Not unless you can make the wings out of the panties. Then that’s fine.”
I hope that helps!
Here is a question in return: if for it to be considered “fly fishing” the line has to be the vehicle that delivers my lead-headed Wonky Zonker, does it stop being fly fishing if I fish the same fly on a 3WT? And instead I must use an 8WT to be “fly fishing”? I suspect that a lot of flies being fished would actually cast further without the flyline!
Have an awesome week. I’m going on an adventure.
Cheers, Paul