While there was much ado last week about Tenkara USA’s new tapered line, there’s also been quite a stir in the line holder department.
Esoteric Tackle
On June 18th, UK-based Esoteric Tackle announced their new ESO Silica line spools. These look pretty interesting, as they not only hold line, but also integrate a small fly box into the spool. Plus, they’re priced extremely reasonably.
Tenkara Pyrenees
Jason Klass covered the release of this new little widget on his Tenkara Talk blog yesterday, essentially a connector that makes two spools of level line into one. It’s kind of an interesting system, one to hold bulk line, rather than line already cut and in use on your rod.
Zen Tenkara
Last, but not least, Zen Tenkara teased a multi-purpose line holder/fly box on their Facebook page on Friday. More to come on this, but with its wooden construction, it’s certainly an eye-catcher.
We’ve definitely come a long way from the ubiquitous “blue spool” that is most commonly associated with tenkara, but I’m not going to lie, it’s still what I use 90% of the time.