Guide Tips

First Cast Quick Flick

Many anglers experience difficulty getting started in casting when they unhook their fly from the keeper on the rod (particularly when using long 12-18 foot leaders as we do in New Zealand). Hold the handle of the rod in your right hand, grab the fly and reach up the rod as far as you can and hook the fly on the bottom of one of the guides well up the rod. Bring the leader back and wrap it around the reel and wind up the excess line so it is all tight and ship-shape. When you are ready to fish, simply take the line from around the reel and drop it, then deliver a sharp tap to the top of the rod and the fly will drop from the guide and you are ready to cast, without the usual difficulty of getting the long leader out through the top guide of the rod!

Dennis Ward has been guiding for 22 years and now specializes in wilderness helicopter fishing for large brown and rainbow trout. Dennis and his wife have a luxury river side cottage which is rented to guests who want a quiet escape from the world. The Ngongotaha River is thirty yards away and the river mouth where it runs into Lake Rotorua is about 100 yards away. The fly fishing for huge browns in the lake margins is fantastic during the high summer months - somewhat like bone fishing, on the sandy bottomed lake edge.