Bentley,

Yes, Cabela's cheap fly rods are a good value, modest price, and a lot of guys are impressed at how well they cast. The most important thing you can do is find a rod that just "feels" good to you. There are almost no bad graphite fly rods on the market today. You should be able to find one you like at every price point. This tends to be disputed only by those who feel the need to rationalize that the $500 - $700 they spent on a high end rod was really necessary in order to obtain superior performance. Only the ultra-elite casters are good enough to extract the performance potential of the most expensive fly rods, and even then, the additional incremental performance is very small relative to the large incremental cost. Use your money wisely and buy a good fly line. The Cortland 444 peach colored line is traditional and still a good performer and a pretty good value. Rumor has it that Hook & Hackle's house brand line is made by Cortland to the 444 formula at a little over half the cost, and anglers like them, but the rumor hasn't been substantiated.

If you're on a budget, cheap reels work just fine. If you're trout fishing, the main reason for a reel is because it tangles badly if you just stuff it in your pants pocket. The trout will never know how much you spent on the reel, and the reel will not effect your ability to cast well and make effective presentations of the fly.

Enjoy.

Sg