"Let’s get out of this (blank) place as soon as we can," said someone as he picked his way meticulously over the poison ivy, "This lake is bewitched." And we all agreed.
Low, ominous clouds hovered over the calm but sullen lake. It seemed as though the lake were sulking because it had not beaten us. However, the hot, motionless, sultry air seemed to be whispering to the waters, "We’ll have one more go at them. They are not out of our clutches yet," for like the many plagues of Egypt, the ghouls of Rice Lake thought up one more way to torment us.
All the way from that poison ivy infested isle to the end of the lake we paddled through clouds of tiny, green insects about half the size of a mosquito. They got in our eyes, ears, mouths and noses, down our necks and all over our arms until we were driven nearly crazy with their tickling. This was the worst endurance test of all. Mile after mile we endured this slow, maddening torture. Don and Cecil found relief by putting mosquito netting around their wide brimmed hats In the manner of an apiarist.
“I wouldn’t send my worst enemy here.” said Bobs as he scooped a hundred of the tiny pests off his arms.
“Nerts," ejaculated Joe writhing in torment, “Some place!”
“Grrrrrrr,” I gasped, “Let’s get out of this bewitched place as soon as we can. PADDLE.”
Why do you hate us lake so blue?
We, thy beauty have admired;
When we got Into the Trent again, the tickling pests disappeared. We ran into a bit of rain and some head wind, but these cleared up later. We enjoyed again the numerous short cuts through a long swampy section and had to keep on the alert for stumps and shoals.
We camped for the second time just above Healey Falls that night. This time it was cooler and there were less mosquitoes. By way of variety, four of us played bridge by the light of a single candle for about an hour. Incidentally may I mention that a few of us had a taste of black bass which Elton had caught in Rice Lake and which he cooked himself - a real treat.
