River Journal #002: Driftless Dreams
- Sheila Marie Higgins
- 7 days ago
- 2 min read
When I looked back through my camera after we got home from our much-anticipated trip to Wisconsin's Driftless Region, I noticed something: there weren't many photographs of fish.
Instead, there were winding roads disappearing into the hills. Bridges. Wildflowers. Aaron standing quietly in the river. Smoke hanging in the valleys. Water moving over limestone. At first, I wondered if I'd somehow documented the wrong parts of the trip. Looking back, I think I was simply paying attention to something I didn't yet have words for.
This was my first fly fishing trip. Like anyone heading somewhere they've dreamed about, I had expectations. I imagined cool mornings, clear water, and learning to catch my first wild brook trout.
The Driftless had other plans.
The week we arrived brought intense heat, heavy humidity, unusually low water, and smoke from Canadian wildfires that settled into the valleys. The streams were still beautiful, but they felt different than I had imagined. Before long, our conversations shifted from where we might find fish to what the streams—and the fish living in them—might need from us.
One of the first things I learned wasn't about fly selection or casting: it was about carrying a thermometer.
Before a fly was tied on or a cast was made, we paused to check the water temperature. As a biology teacher, I already understood the relationship between water temperature, dissolved oxygen, and the physiology of cold-water fish. What surprised me wasn't the science—it was how naturally it became part of our rhythm on the river. The thermometer wasn't there to tell us where to fish. It reminded us to begin by paying attention.
We woke before dawn and still fished when conditions allowed–even a nibble from a native fish felt like a gift rather than an expectation. On the warmer afternoons, though, we found ourselves lingering in different ways. We wandered gravel roads. We stopped on old bridges just to watch the current. I photographed wildflowers growing along the streambank and insects resting in the sumac. Aaron studied seams and riffles with the same quiet attention, even when we knew we might never make a cast there.
It didn't feel like we were missing out. If anything, we were learning to experience the river without asking it to give us something in return.
Looking back, I never caught my first Driftless trout. Oddly enough, that isn't what I remember most. I remember learning to slow down, to notice more than I expected, and to understand that these rivers don't owe us fish. Sometimes, the first lesson is simply to pay attention.
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