At 750 feet above Seventh Lake, the scenery below was truly awe inspiring. While still climbing and banking right, the plane hit a thermal pocket and as much as instantaneously dropped 25 feet! Suddenly that awe inspiring view turned dangerously vomit inspiring. A quick inventory of the Cessna Stationair cabin revealed only a single, flimsy, plastic shopping bag in a seat-mounted storage mesh. I silently deemed the bag not up for the task; instead muttering, "This is not a good thing."
It was one of those 90 degree, 90 percent humidity days (hence the thermal), it was a very enclosed environment: four adults and two youngsters pretty much maxed out the cabin space, and puking out a window at 120 MPH was out of the question. All I could do was pray for equilibrium and fight off an involuntary urgency which clearly had a mind of its own.
Miracles do happen and the ride smoothed out enough for me to cautiously relax my lower esophageal sphincter - not to mention that other important sphincter.
It wasn't long after that the pilot pointed out two lakes with what appeared to be very little land separating them, adding that looks can be deceiving. He then rattled off their names and the elevation difference between the two. But with the roar of the engine, wind noise, and my less than golden ears, I wasn't able to catch the numbers. And I didn't even catch their names.
Though the two lakes disappeared from my field of vision as we proceeded on to Raquette Lake, a curiosity seed had been planted. Their aerial image was stuck in my brain.