Project Clearwater — Expedition 24

In keeping with the theme of the wild swings of Bayou Fountain water levels, we were back at 6 feet below the bridge.  Also, there were a few mosquitoes.

The gauge on Bayou Fountain at Bluebonnet had been quite a useful source of information.  It was showing a steady retreat in water levels after our recent heavy rains, so we were expecting low water levels on the weekend.  Then on the morning of May 20th, it apparently broke.  Suddenly, the reading went to zero (which is not a legitimate number for the gauge), and then the data stopped coming altogether.  Well, at least the chain gauge is working, although it’s not as easy to check from your desk.

We arrived at the park to find the chain gauge showing a full six feet of bridge clearance.  At that level, the launch is a bit more interesting, but if you’ve got the boots for it, the soft mud with embedded logs and such does provide some convenience.  Right there at the launch, there is quite a lot of wood embedded in the bottom of the bayou, and with such low water, much of it was showing.  We jumped right in (or slogged right across, as the case may be) and tackled a good chunk of the middle section, clearing the embedded logs and branches to make for an easier passage through.  The photo above is the “after” shot.

After the bit of clearing right at the launch, we headed off down the bayou.  We noted the current status of the Rainbow, but as the root ball end of it seems to be quite embedded, we decided to leave it for more observation.  (That trunk is *not* easy to move.)  We sawed up some logs and cleared some debris and just kept going down the bayou to see what we would find.

We found mosquitoes.

The mosquitoes on the bayou hadn’t been that bad this year, except for one or two weekends when they were a bit too plentiful for comfort.  This time around, however, they were phenomenal.  If you kept paddling faster than a certain speed, you were *mostly* fine (except for a few overachieving bloodsuckers), but the moment you slowed down, they were on you.  You don’t want to think about what happened when you stopped.  It wasn’t pleasant.  What *was* somewhat entertaining (in an annoying sort of way) was that when you glanced behind you as you paddled along, you *literally* saw a mosquito-wake.  Even more amazing to see was when someone paddled by you.  They *literally* looked like Pigpen from Peanuts with a perfectly visible cloud of mosquitoes around their head.  I’d rarely seen anything quite like it.

At one point near the Bayou Manchac end of Bayou Fountain, we were sawing the top off a downed tree to widen the paddle route around it, when a pair of kayakers came upon us.  They were also down from Highland Road Park, and they had also been experiencing the day of the mosquitoes.  Apparently they did not have mosquito repellant with them, and I had earlier looked for mine and not found it anywhere in my canoe.  After a bit of conversation, they proceeded onward while we wrapped up with the tree, all of us wishing we’d had some oh-so-wonderful DEET.

After wrapping up the downed tree, we continued on toward Bayou Manchac.  At the last group of long-downed trees, we found the extremely long trunk/log that has been floating up and down the last bit of Bayou Fountain for a while now.  It has more than once caused temporary jams, so being ahead of “schedule”, we decided to take care of it.  Paddling such a long log around was quite… interesting… but in the end we got it clear of the end of Bayou Fountain and moored it elsewhere where it will not cause a problem for anyone (who knows, it might even help).

All in all, it was a good day on the bayou.  The low water presented a few metaphorical speed bumps in the form of shallows that we raked out, and I got another literal speed bump as a souvenir.  (Now I have one for my carport *and* one for my driveway, woo-hoo!)  Paddling back up the bayou, we hit a few more shallows.  We would’ve stopped to rake those out, but by that point the mosquito situation had gone *far* beyond merely annoying.  It was like the bayou version of “Speed” — no Sandra Bullock in a bus, just us in canoes, but you had to keep up a certain speed or *BOOM*… er… well, whatever sound mosquitoes make as they drain you dry in one terrible moment.

The mosquitoes were so bad, we stopped even trying to get “cute” snake pictures by the last few miles.  If only we had insect repellant (and perhaps mosquito head nets), it wouldn’t have been bad at all.  It really was a pleasant day except for the torture part, go figure.  Finally, about 6-1/4 hours after we’d set off, we arrived back at the launch and made our emphatic and expeditious exit from the land of a million bites, vowing to stop right there on the way home to stock up on much needed repellant.  With a little spraying, next time out should be *MUCH* more pleasant.

I like to say that even unpleasant situations can be worthwhile for the stories they give you, and we were going to have a pretty good story about how we survived our day as veritable mosquito-comets flying along the bayou.  Every so often, however, something happens that makes the stories just that much better for the telling.  As I was unloading the canoes and packing everything up, I looked down into one of the gear buckets that I had just carried to the car.  Immediately, I called Mike over and told him to look in the bucket.  After a moment, he noticed what I had just seen, and the story… well…