ORIGINAL: PABowhntr

I owned a pair of the 10x42 Cabelas Alaskan Guide series binocs and have looked through their new Eurobins. Both are excellent bins. The Guides offer excellent optical quality at the $500 price point. Resolution, flatness of field, contrast, etc... were excellent. Don't quote me but I believe they are made by Fujinon. The Cabelas Euro binocs are equally impressive and pretty close to being on par with the upper end Zeiss, Leica and Swaro. When you get to this optical quality level you start paying more for the little things...slightly better contrast, truer color representation, a slightly wider field of view, a flatter overall field, etc.... I believe the Cabelas Euro bins are made by Meopta, a well regarded European binocular manufacturer. Cabelas also has the Meopta Meostar models for sale as well.

If you would like two great sites to visit to get the ins and outs of just about every high end bin out there then check out www.birdforum.net and www.opticstalk.com . Both have very good binocular sections with some real gurus on the various models. I do not think you really can go wrong with any of the high end glass. The optical quality is not usually what allows folks to distinguish from one high end model to the next. It usually has more to do with the ergonomics, warranty, price, etc.....

I have a pair of the Nikon High Grade Venturer LXs that I picked up for a steal at the local Cabelas. Definitely high quality glass but the price was a bit more manageable compared to some of the other high end models on the market today.

Hope this helps.