RiverBums: Beauty is in the Eye of the Rod Holder

Beauty, like time, is often fleeting. Present for just a few years or maybe a moment and then it passes by, evolving on to the next stage. A painting or a statue can be preserved for a while. But it it is those fickle rarities of elegance that although find permanent places in our hearts, cannot withstand the test of time.

Take a rose for instance. At first, the bud is hidden from all eyes as it ferments its visual grace within a thin cocoon of supplemental buttress. Then while it blooms, it begins to one by one, expose each pedal as if in a perennial burlesque show. Teasing with each new shape and shade of blossom as it finally establishes it’s exquisite garb of beauty. But then, the cord is pulled, and you pluck the rose from it’s sleeping beauty bed and without realizing, you have started the timer. Soon, it will wither and cripple into a ball of crunchy brown decay and dissipate into dust as it disappears with the wind. Like we said, beauty is fleeting.

So fleeting that it is important to catch it while we can, wherever we can. Whether standing in the river, on the road, or 5 am coffee in some cafe, we make time to capture the beauty of this country and the treasures we find along the way.

But, it's not just the rooted rose we find beauty in. Oh no! Our interests also lie within the appearance of the decayed flower and what beauty it holds that may not otherwise be accepted by mainstream society. A broken down bridge, an abandoned church, and even some 20 something overly confident, nonstop smiling girl who caught 3 more bass than her dad did this past weekend. And let's just say a total of 3 bass were caught, the whole weekend. Yep, that's beauty!

And it was a sight to behold as our journey started in Wisconsin and found its way through NE Iowa and southern Minnesota. 900 miles covered as we experimented in various trout streams and rivers, including the Mequoketa River, Turkey River, Upper Iowa River, and eventually, the Mississippi.

It was the Upper Iowa that AC found beautiful success with her 3 bass (not pictured below due to lack of acceptable size). Using yellow spinner bait with a red and white tail is what did the trick this time around.

Despite the lack of abundance of fish, we still found time to capture the oddball glamor of the countryside with our cameras as we bummed our way through the midwest...