304 
The Colorado River 
Meanwhile, as noted in the last chapter, our own party had 
passed the Crossing of the Fathers, had arrived at the mouth 
of the Paria, and, according to our plans, had cached our boats 
there for the winter while we proceeded to inaugurate our 
land work of triangulation. A number of us were left for 
a while in camp in a valley lying between the Kaibab Plateau, 
then called Buckskin Mountain, and what is now called Paria 
Plateau, at a spring in a gulch of the Vermilion Cliffs. Two 
The Dining-table in Camp. 
Dutch oven, left foreground. 
Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh. 
large rocks at this place had fallen together in such a way that 
one could crawl under for shelter. This was on the old trail 
leading from the Mormon settlements to the Moki country, 
travelled about once a year by Jacob Hamblin and a party on 
a trading expedition to the other side of the river. Somebody 
on one of these trips had taken refuge beneath this rock, and 
on departing had written, in a facetious mood, along the top 
with a piece of charcoal, '*Rock House Hotel, Naturally, 
in referring to the spring it was called, by the very few who 
