Iowa Water Trail Assn. and friends,

I offer two wonderful stories of time spent on Iowa's Lake Red Rock

Gerry Rowland, Coordinator
IWTA

John Pearson heads the Preserves division of the Iowa DNR

October 21, 2001- I kayaked on Red Rock Reservoir this morning. Yesterday's
winds had died down and the temperature was mild. Even though the sky was
overcast and somewhat gloomy as I loaded the kayak onto the car, the sun was
breaking through openings in the clouds by the time I arrived at the
lakeshore. I drove to Whitebreast Creek east of Knoxville instead of my usual
put-in spot by the Mile-Long Bridge. Whitebreast Creek is farther away from
home (33 miles instead of 21), but I visit the Mile-Long Bridge area so often
that I worry about losing appreciation of its beauty through habituation.

As usual, the 19,000-acre reservoir was deserted on a Sunday morning. The
still-rising sun was hidden behind a bank of low clouds at 9AM but its light
illuminated the landscape of calm, blue water and forested bluffs splashed
with fall colors. I pushed off from shore and paddled east until the sun rose
above the clouds and dazzled my vision with its blinding spotlight and myriad
of eye-piercing reflections. I swung west and retraced my route (stopping
briefly at the car to fetch my sunglasses and visored cap). Continuing
westward with the sun at my back, the view ahead was brightly lit and
colorful.

A black line on the horizon between blue lake and variegated land became a raft of about 500 milling coots, their white bills contrasting sharply with
their black bodies. Although the nearest ones skittered nervously at my
approach, the majority of the flock stayed calm as I veered course and passed
to one side. I passed two more flocks of this size, making a total of about
1500 birds. At one point, one flock behind me panicked at some unseen
disturbance and splashed noisily as they ran horizontally across the water
surface prior to taking flight. It sounded like a crowd of people erupting in
applause at the entrance onto the stage of an awaited emcee.

Now in the open lake away from shore, I soaked in the expanse of space
uncluttered with houses, trees, powerlines, and cars. Distant cliffs
beckoned. Placid water waited. Time paused.

Resisting the temptation to strike out across the water for the opposite shore
(and committing myself to a many-hour outing in conflict with the start of my
son's soccer game), I angled into a nearby bay and paddled toward bluffs made
picturesque by slanting sunlight. Sandstone, shale, coal, gravel, and loess
formed layers that spoke of geological history written by streams, swamps,
wind, water, gravity, and limitless time.

Rounding a point to rejoin the big lake, I encountered a gentle east wind that
had cropped up during my sidetrip in the bay. Flocks of coots scooted out of
my path as I glided through shallow water, where a view of sunken rocks gave
me a sense of flying. A man stood on the shore, admiring the view. "Beautiful, isn't it?" he called to me as I passed.
The final mile back to the car passed smoothly. After loading the kayak, I
scanned the azimuth one more time, then drove home through an October
landscape.


***


November 3, 2001- another clear, calm, mild day for kayaking on Red Rock
Reservoir. Temperate days in November like this one are like the last grains
of sand disappearing down the narrows of the seasonal hourglass. Winter will
soon fill the void. Today is a grain of time that I will spend on the lake.

I put in at the Coal Bank landing in the Whitebreast Recreation Area. The
entrance sign said to pay $2.00 to launch here, but the fee box at the boat
ramp was sealed with plastic for the approaching winter. Free pass. Once in
the water, the choice lay between heading out into the big lake or up the
narrowing bay of Whitebreast Creek. I had always declined to go up the bay on
previous trips because of I expected to see only dull scenery of muddy banks
and the "bathtub ring" of dead vegetation from annual summertime drowning with
water held back by the Army Corps dam. Today I paddled up the bay on impulse
and, upon rounding a low mudbank, was rewarded with the sight of a distant
sandstone bluff that I had never visited before.
Targeted on this destination, I paddled through calm water past extensive
mudbanks vegetated mostly with cocklebur and a few wooded tracts on low
bluffs. A few grebes watched me warily as I passed. Sounds reaching me from
the shoreline included the nasal jeering of blue jays and the rattle of an
agitated kingfisher. At one point, I passed an oncoming duck-hunter's boat,
camouflaged with shrub cuttings strapped onto the gunwales. It may fool the
ducks when parked silently in a marsh, but it looked ridiculous motoring
quickly along the shoreline, throwing a wake as it wove in and out of sidebays
in a vain search for huntable waterfowl. They ignored the hundreds of coots
that they spooked away from the shoreline. I figured that they had already
given up hunting and were just taking a scenic route back to the boat ramp.

The bluff I was approaching finally drew near enough to see its details. It
was an oval pad of bare sandstone, capped with oak forest, at the tip of a
narrow peninsula. About 50 feet in height, pale tan in color, extensively
cross-bedded and pock-marked, this was the lithified remains of an ancient
sandbar laid down in a Pennsylvanian stream some 300 million years ago.
Gentle waves sloshing against the base of the bluff gurgled in small alcoves
and undercut ledges as I approached. A smear of russet color at the top of
the bluff announced the presence of little bluestem and hinted that other
prairie plants also lived there. Marcesant oaks amid the otherwise bare
forest canopy confirmed that autumn had all but ended.
I determined to go ashore, but the bluff was so sheer that I had to paddle
toward the neck of the peninsula to find a landing. Even then, I had to drag
the kayak up atop a narrow ledge. I wedged it unstably between two boulders
and stood back dubiously, watching for gravity to pull it back into the lake. After a minute, I concluded it would stay put long enough for a quick visit to
the blufftop. Nonetheless, I kept glancing back frequently as I scrambled up
the rock face, just in case I needed to rush back to the shoreline to keep
from being marooned.

The climb over the steep, sleek rock was exhilarating. Each step upward
revealed an ever-widening perspective of upper bay landscape, full of
sparkling water, clear sky, and long views of the opposite shore. The top of
the cliff was a flat, narrow, natural sidewalk. I sauntered along this
sandstone pathway with a sudden dropoff to the lake to my right and a woodland
edge to my left. At the outermost tip of the peninsula, I stopped and enjoyed
the full vista. It is moments like this....

Turning my attention to the plants on the blufftop, I easily found the little
bluestem grass that I had seen from below. Leadplant, too. A stunted tree
growing on the cliff edge turned out to be Bush oak (Quercus bushii), a hybrid
between black oak (Q. velutina) and blackjack oak (Q. marilandica, which is
common in Missouri but rare in Iowa). I collected a small herb that I had
never seen below, pressing it in my wallet. I'll identify it later.

On my walk back to the kayak, I was startled by 5-foot long, freshly molted
bullsnake slinking along a ledge. It was so large that dry oak leaves crackled as it slid over them. After a short standoff, I assured the snake I
meant no harm and passed on. I failed to find its skin cast, although the
snake's bright color meant it must have just finished shedding nearby.

I threaded my way down the bluff back to the kayak (it was still there). Paddling around the peninsula, I spied a gang of raucous crows, who flew off
like a bunch of boys who have been discovered at mischief. Further down the
shoreline, a deer bolted across open land, its rhythmic running motion
punctuated by long, graceful leaps over low obstacles. Further on, a lone
bald eagle sat stoically on a lone bur oak. The wind picked up as I crossed
the final strait.
I landed, packed up, and drove home. A grain of time well spent.

John Pearson