Long story short, tenkara just found itself in the hands of some great anglers, one may say "the biggest of big guns" at a gathering in the River Itchen, one of the most famous chalk streams in the UK.
British angling author Peter Lapsley recently discovered tenkara. By chance, the day after he received his tenkara gear, he attended a small gathering of some of Britain’s best and best known fly fishers and angling writers for a day’s grayling fishing on the famous River Itchen. Of course, he took his coolest new toy to the gathering and amused many people with it.
Mr. Lapsley said, "We all tried it, liked it and were intrigued by it; it is a most attractive blend of ancient Japanese tradition with modern materials and technology."
The gentlemen in the picture are (left to right): Neil Patterson (author of Chalk Stream Chronicle), John Goddard (well-known angling entomologist and designer of numerous trout flies such as the Goddard Caddis), Brian Clarke (fishing editor of UK's The Times) and Dr Tony Hayter (author of the definitive biography of F.M. Halford and of a future biography of another great angler).