A newb with a old bamboo rod...

I’ve just recently gotten into fly fishing and bought a cheapish 6wt Cabela’s rod/reel combo to start with. I’ve taken it out a few times on a few different lakes and loved it once I was able to throw a decent cast. Well I took it out a few weekends ago and ended up snapping the rod and ending my fishing for the weekend so I was pretty pissed with myself about that.

So now I’m on the hunt for a better quality rod to feed this what feels like is going to be a fun addiction, but in the meantime while I’m searching for that new rod I remembered seeing a few old rods stuffed away in my parents garage a long long time ago , so I headed over to see if there were any fly rods in the pile. Well low and behold there was, it’s an old bamboo fly rod and reel that’s caked in years of spider webs. It’s a two piece bamboo rod with the name “Great Lakes” and the reel is a flyman Edgar sealy. The rod looks to be in decent shape and some other writing on it makes me believe it’s a 7wt.

So now to my questions, would this rod be ok to use or could it be weak and fragile being that it’s old?And could I use modern fly line on the reel? Could I take the reel off the broken Cabela’s rod and put it on the Great Lakes rod? Or should I just clean it up a bit and hang it on the wall and wait until I can afford a new rod?

Hold onto the split cane rod as a keepsake. Maybe find out some history on it. Go back to Cabelas and pick up their RLS combo and go fishing.

I have an old custom made split cane rod and reel from a rod maker in Scotland. I get the itch to take it out every now and then, then common sense gets the better of me.

A number of years ago I inherited an old bamboo fly rod from my Late Father-In-Law, it was his first "real" rod, as best we can determine its @ 100 years old now.
I was going to fish it once just to honour him but there's a broken ferrule on it and I wanted to leave it "as is", no repairs.
A feller I used to work with for years, a well known Thompson River Steelheader dropped into my office maybe 20 years ago and handed me two antique Hardy reels. Quite valuable now. He just said he wasn't using them, maybe I could.
So now the bamboo rod and the Hardy reel are on the wall of our cabin in honour and respect of both of these men who have passed into history.
That's what I would do with your rod.