Nine voyage lake’s lobes, returning with a few extra? (6)
I believe the answer is:
eleven
'nine' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'returning with a few extra?' is the wordplay.
'returning' says the letters should be written in reverse.
'with' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'a few' becomes 'v'.
'extra?' becomes 'neele' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'v' going into 'neele' is 'nevele'.
'nevele' in reverse letter order is 'ELEVEN'.
'voyage lake's lobes' is the link.
This may not be right. Some or all of it may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for eleven that I've seen before include "Cricketing side" , "Number on a soccer team" , "XI as Roman numeral" , "Cardinal" , "Footballers" .)