I am not a fly fisherman but would love to have one on the boat at times when the albacore and small dolphin are around in schools. I know that we are talking about two different beasts here and if you could suggest a rod for both that would be great. I don't want to break the bank on these blanks since I will probably only use them maybe twice a year.
Thanks for your help!!

If you're going to be building your own rod, I strongly recommend Black Dog Tackle, a board sponsor. Like you, I wanted to get into fly fishing the salt, but was extremely put off by the cost involved -- I wasn't gonna spend $300 for a fly rod. Well, I found Black Dog through this board, ordered a 10-wt blank and components, and I cannot overstate how thrilled I am with the results. People I've showed it to can't believe that I was able to put it together for less than $100. And the components aren't chintzy, either: I've stacked my Black Dog rod up against other rods I've seen, and the components (blank, cork, reel seat, etc.) are far superior in quality than the other stuff.

I'm a complete novice to fly fishing the salt, so I'm not sure what weight blank would be best for your uses (my guess would be that a 10-weight would be best, but that's just a guess). In any case, Black Dog has 8,9,10, and 12 weight blanks, so you should be able to find what you want. I can't recommend Joe and Black Dog strongly enough -- I don't need another fly rod, but I want to build one because I like their stuff so much.

Wow!

Chris, thank you for the comments. I am very pleased that your experience with us was such a good one. Although, now I have to work even harder to live up to your recommendation!

Thanks, again.

Joe

Joe Douglas