Looking up a Side Canyon of the Grand Canyon in the Kaibab Division.
Photograph by J.K. HILLERS, U.S. Colo. Riv. Exp.
It was now the beginning of September, but the water and the air were not so cold as they had been the year before in Cataract Canyon, and we did not suffer from being so constantly saturated. Running on the next day following the Bright Angel camp, we found the usual number of large rapids, in one of which a wave struck the steering oar and knocked Jones out of the boat all but his knees, by which he clung to the gunwale, nearly capsizing us. We found it impossible to help him, but somehow he got in again. The river was everywhere very swift and turbulent. One stretch of three and a half miles we ran in fifteen minutes. There were numerous whirlpools, but nothing to stop our triumphant progress. On the 2d of September there were two portages, and twenty rapids run, in the fifteen miles made during the day. Many of these rapids were very heavy descents. That night we camped above a bad-looking place, but it was decided to run it in the morning. Three-quarters of a mile below camp there was a general disappearance of the waters. We could see nothing of the great rapid from the level of the boats, though we caught an occasional glimpse of the leaping, tossing edges, or tops, of the huge billows rolling out beyond into the farther depths of the chasm. About eight o’clock in the morning all was ready for the start. The inflated life-preservers, as was customary in our boat, were laid behind the seats where we could easily reach them. The Major put his on, a most fortunate thing for him as it turned out, but we who were at the oars did not for the reason before mentioned,—that they interfered with the free handling of the boat. The men of the Cañonita took positions where they could observe and profit by our movements. Then out into the current we pushed and were immediately swept downward with ever-increasing speed toward the centre of the disturbance, the black walls springing up on each side of the impetuous waters like mighty buttresses for the lovely blue vault of the September sky, so serenely quiet. Accelerated by the rush of a small intervening rapid, our velocity appeared to multiply till we were flying along like a railway train. The whole width of the river dropped away before us, falling some twenty-five or thirty feet, at least, in a short space. We now saw that the rapid was of a particularly difficult nature, and the order was given to attempt a landing on some rocks at its head, on the left. At the same instant this was seen to be impossible. Our only safety lay in taking the plunge in the main channel. We backwatered on our oars to check our speed a trifle, and the next moment with a wild leap we went over, charging into the roaring, seething, beating waves below. Wave after wave broke over us in quick succession, keeping our standing-rooms full. The boat plunged like a bucking broncho, at the same time rolling with fierce violence. As rapidly as possible we bailed with our kettles, but the effort was useless. At length, as we neared the end, an immense billow broke upon our port bow with a resounding crack. The little craft succumbed. With a quick careen she turned upside down, and we were in the foaming current. I threw up my hand and fortunately grasped a spare oar that was fastened along the outside of the boat. This enabled me to pull myself above the surface and breathe. My felt hat had stuck to my head and now almost suffocated me. Pushing it back I looked around. Not a sign of life was to be seen. The river disappeared below in the dark granite. My companions were gone. I was apparently alone in the great chasm. But in a moment or two Powell and Hillers, who had both been pulled down by the whirlpool that was keeping all together, shot up like rockets beside me, and then I noticed Jones clinging to the ring in the stern. As we told Powell, after this experience was over, he had tried to make a geological investigation of the bed of the river, and this was not advisable. Hillers and I climbed on the bottom of the upturned boat, and by catching hold of the opposite gunwale, and throwing ourselves back, we brought her right-side up. Then we two climbed in, an operation requiring nice calculation, for she rolled so much with the load of water that her tendency was to turn over again on slight provocation. We bailed with our hats rapidly. There was need for expeditious work, for we could not tell what might be around the corner. Presently enough water was out to steady the boat, and we then helped Powell and Jones to get in. Our oars had fortunately remained in the rowlocks, and grasping them, without waiting to haul in the hundred feet of line trailing in the current, we made for the left wall, where I managed to leap out on a shelf and catch the rope over a projection, before the Cañonita, unharmed, dashed up to the spot; her only mishap was the loss of a rowlock and two oars.
A Capsize in the Grand Canyon.
Drawing by F.S. DELLENBAUGH.
Starting once more on the swift current, we found rapids sometimes so situated that it was difficult to make a landing for examination. At one of these places, towards evening, a good deal of time was spent working down to the head of an ugly looking spot which could not be fairly seen. An enormous rock lay in the very middle at the head of the descent. There was no landing-place till very near the plunge, and in dropping down when we came to the point where it was planned that I should jump out upon a projecting flat rock, a sudden lurch of the boat due to what Stanton afterwards called fountains, and we termed boils, caused me, instead of landing on the rock, to disappear in the rushing waters. The current catching the boat, she began to move rapidly stern foremost toward the fall. Powell and Jones jumped out on rocks as they shot past, hoping to catch the line, but they could not reach it, and Jones had all he could do to get ashore. Meanwhile I had come to the surface, and going to the boat by means of the line which I still held, I fairly tumbled on board. Hillers handed me one of my oars which had come loose, and we were ready to take the fall, now close at hand, albeit we were stern first. As we sped down, the tide carried us far up on the huge rock, whose shelving surface sank upstream below the surging torrent, and at the same moment turned our bow towards the left-hand bank. Perceiving this advantage we pulled with all our strength and shot across the very head of the rapid, running in behind a large rock on the brink, where the boat lodged till I was able to leap ashore, or rather to another rock where there was a footing, and make fast the line. It was a close shave. The Cañonita, forewarned, was able to let down to this place, from whence we made a portage to the bottom the next morning. When once started again, we found ourselves in a very narrow gorge, where for four or five miles it was impossible to stop on account of the swift current which swept the boats along like chaff before a gale, swinging them from one side to the other, and often turning them round and round in the large whirlpools despite every effort we made to prevent this performance. In fact, we had no control of the craft in this distance, and it was fortunate that there was nothing worse to be here encountered. The whirlpools were the most perfect specimens I ever saw. Usually they were about twenty feet in diameter, drawing evenly down toward the vortex, the centre being probably about eighteen inches to two feet below the rim. The vortex at the top was about six to ten inches in diameter, diminishing in five or six feet to a mere point at the bottom. Our boats were twenty-two feet long, and as they were turned around in these whirls they about reached across them, while we could look over the side and see the vortex sucking down every small object. The opposite of these was the fountains, or boils, where the surface was exactly the reverse of the whirls: a circular mass of water about twenty feet in diameter would suddenly lift itself a foot or two above the general surface with a boiling, swirling movement. As I remember them they were usually the forerunners of the whirlpools.
