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Updated: July 10, 2025
At Baker's Basin the bridge-tender, a one-legged man, pressed me to tarry till he could summon the Methodist minister, who had charged him to notify him of the approach of a paper canoe. Through all my boat journeys I have remarked that professional men take more interest in canoe journeys than professional oarsmen; and nearly all the canoeists of my acquaintance are ministers of the gospel.
She had no thwarts, and the paddlers were therefore compelled to squat tailor- fashion in the bottom of her, looking forward. This was, so far, fortunate; since she was so frightfully crank that, with such unaccustomed canoeists as ourselves, it was only by keeping our centres of gravity low down that we prevented her capsizing the moment we stepped into her.
"I have had a great time exploring," said Dorothy, sipping the refreshing tea, "and I think, Cologne, that there are many kinds of camping days. But if you will only let me go out, I have an idea I know where Tavia might be." Then she told of her trip on the lake, and how quickly the young canoeists left the water to answer a call of a clew having been found.
"I guess the little dinghy would live between here and the shore," he remarked, as he came in presently. "What's in the wind now?" demanded Maurice, already pouring out the amber liquid into the brace of tin cups that served them just as well as the dainty aluminum ones sported by some canoeists they had once known in their Kentucky home town.
Tom and Bob, old canoeists, knew well the appearance of water that denotes a sunken rock, and by sheer skill and watchfulness turned their canoe aside ever and again with a quick sweep of the paddles, to avoid a treacherous place, where the water whirled ominously.
If, however, any of the canoeists had made the carry completely, and had launched their craft above, they could not be called back. The Ellison brothers were about half way up the carry at this time. "I don't think we could do it, Henry," answered Harvey, to the other's suggestion. "We could get part of the way up, all right, but the last few rods are too steep."
Some expert canoeists strongly advise kneeling in the bottom of the canoe while paddling, for at least part of the time, but the usual method is to sit on the seats provided at bow and stern, or sit on the bottom. The kneeling paddler has her canoe in better control, and becomes more one with it than one who sits.
Two gentlemen, who attempted to cross in a birch-bark canoe too near the rapids, were caught by the eddy round the point; the canoe was capsized, and went to pieces over the first rapid, while the canoeists, with great difficulty, swam to the further shore, striking it only a few feet above the rapid barely enough to save their lives.
Arriving in Norfolk at dusk of the same day, I stored my canoe in the warehouse of the Old Dominion Steamship Company, and quietly retired to a hotel which promised an early meal in the morning, congratulating myself the while that I had avoided the usual show of curiosity tendered to canoeists at city piers, and above all had escaped the inevitable reporter.
At daylight a large crocodile was floating on the bay near the camp, but sank out of sight as the campers showed themselves. From the bay the canoeists entered a deep river with high banks on which were growing madeira, wild sapadillo, palms of several kinds and other varieties of trees.
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