The Northern California Fly Fishing Board

As I was looking through one of the ffing catalogs we get here, I was struck by the prices of some of the reels. Why would someone spend $700 on a reel for a 5 wt? Does it really do the job that much better than a $70 reel? Besides "because you can", what other reason would you have? I can understand if you are going for bonefish and don't want your reel to explode, or steelhead... but for a 4 wt or 5 wt? For non-monster trout? I almost never put a fish actually on the reel to begin with.

Help me understand.

B-