Yup, old thread. I don't have a "one" rod that meets the 3 criteria listed by the OP.
In 1972 I begin using an UL spinning rod for high lakes and streams with 1/8 oz Daredevle spoons and a teardrop casting float to cast flies. I was
never skunked using that combination.
My first rod for fly casting in the mid 1970s was a Fenwick spin-fly combo and a Shakespear Omni 33 reel.. It was nice because I hiked into high lakes and streams and could use one rod for spin fishing and fly casting.
After reading The Curtis Creek Manifesto in ~1986 I did buy a 9' 6 weight Cortland graphite rod and fell in love with fly fishing and the pursuit of the mythical Curtis Creek small streams (I still have two). However the rod that made me give away the Fenwick and put away the UL spinning rod for many-many years was a 9' 6 weight Gary Loomis Signature IMX in 1992. I still use that rod for fishing nymphs and streamers. Now the bigger waters and large fish were calling.
I rediscovered small streams again in 2009 and was using a very nice March Brown Hidden Waters 9' 7 pc 4 weight rod that is a great all-round high lakes and streams pack rod. But in 2011 I bought the TFO 7'9" Finesse that OMJ raves about. Wow, nice small stream rod, and I fell in love with small streams all over again! In 2015 I bought a 7' 2pc Pennington Pine River bamboo rod (Garrison 201 taper) that fishes best for me with a DTF3 and like it even more. I used the TFO when I knew I would be bushwhacking, and the Pennington for easy access stuff.
However in 2017 I came under the
faerie spell. My buddy who taught me to fly fish in 1978 discovered Tenkara
. I fished many small waters with him that year using my bamboo rod. My initial disbelief and disdain slowly morphed to amusement, then to being truly impressed with the number and
size of the fish that he landed with just a rod, line, and an unweighted (dry-wet) fly.
At the end of that season, I purchased a very nice Tenkara rod; a DRAGONtail Hydra 390zx that fishes at 3.5 and 3.9 meter lengths, with all the accessories I needed to begin for $125, shipped. In the winter of 2017-2018 I read every article and watched every video I could find about how to fish using the traditional Tenkara methods. In early May 2018 I went to a well known local stream with the Tenkara rod and was skunked. Two weeks later I returned and caught 6 fish including the largest fish I had landed in that stream over 8 consecutive years, using a weighted nymph and dry-wet flies. The "impressed" from 2017 immediately changed to "astonished" that a rod able to detect light takes from a 4" fish and make it seem "sporting" could put up one hell of a fight and land a 16" fish with "authority".
That one fish changed me immediately and probably forever, not so much to be purely a Tenkara angler; ex. my 9' 7 pc 4 weight is a better high lakes rod, but that simple gear and techniques harkening to me all the way back from the 1980s with The Curtis Creek Manifesto along with
precise tight line drifts will
get it done.
I have since purchased two shorter rods; A full flex Tenkara Times Watershed 300Z that fishes at 2.4, 2.7, and 3 meters that's the
ideal rod for brushy creeks with overhead cover, and the DRAGONtail Mizuchi 340zx that fishes at 2.4, 2.9, and 3.4 meter lengths that is more versatile and could almost be an EDC rod. I also bought a
much longer Suntech GM "Keiryu" Special 53 rod that fishes at 4.5, 4.8, and 5.3 meter lengths and can cast weighted nymphs or dry-wet flies a good ways out into big water like the Deschutes near Warm Springs and land larger fish, but the Hydra is still my "S" river rod, and a
great all-round beginners' rod for EDC.
BTW, I'm going to try using my Keiryu rod at a salt beach in this midday high tide cycle to see if I can hook and land SRC. But I won't be leaving my western 6 weight beach rod at home
.