Travel Rods...

I recently had a chance to go visit my folks and brother up North in Canada. I managed to squeeze in a few hours of fishing and hooked into a boatload of Smallmouth. I brought 3 travel rods with me - The Megabass Triza Dragoon, The Orochi SS X4 Cyclone Backpacker and the Orochi SS X4 Whip Snake. Easy rods to pack and assemble.

The X4 rods are great. Nothing mind blowing but they fit in a small suitcase with no issue. They are great all around "no frills" rods that have that Megabass old school stamp... The cyclone is better as a moving bait rod for shallow cranks and top water; the Whip Snake can hold its own on pretty much any application for a spinning rod. Both were a joy to fish.

The Dragoon is a super nice rod too. Doesn't pack down quite as small because it is a 3-piece rod, but it is a beautiful rod with 2 different tips - a regular tip and a fast tip. The claim is that it will pull double duty as a big bait rod and a jig rod (the rod is rated 1/2 oz to 3 oz).

I really enjoyed the Dragoon as a cranking stick, did really well with OSP Blitz DR Ex. The fast tip was great to whip cast the cranks a country mile. I could feel the wiggle really well and knew right away when the crank snagged the smallest piece of grass. And it was great to keep the fish pinned; I hooked a few fish very far from the boat and had no issue getting them in the boat.

However, it was disappointing as a jig rod. Maybe it's my style, but it felt way too parabolic to get a good hookset. When I did hook a fish, I had issues keeping them pinned and lost something absurd like 10 fish (and got frustrated), probably because I wasn't getting a good hookset. Of course, it has to be the rod, not me, lol. My assessment is that the fast tip is nice for casting and working the jig, but it doesn't make a big difference on a hookset as I found myself getting into the backbone quickly and then it became a very parabolic hookset. Maybe it's how I set the hook, which tends to be more upward for jigs and more sideways for cranks. But, to me, it feels like this rod would also need a different mid-section for jigs for the entire rod to behave like the jig rods I am used to.

The same usual disclaimers apply, I spent 4 hours on the water with these rods, not 2 years deeply studying them 😎

In any case, maybe this experience is helpful for somebody. Does anybody have any good recommendations for a travel rod for 1/2 oz football jigs? The Triza Stympalides seems to be designed for jigs but the "medium fast" taper scares me a bit after my experience with the dragoon... My fishing style is to do snap vertical hooksets with jigs. And I don't remember the last time I actually lost a fish on jig (before this outing).