402 
FOREST AND 
STREAM 
■ 
Whirling Rapids About a Mile. 
bend where the river went to the southwest and 
where several miles below appeared to make its 
way out of the gorge, but with broken water as 
far as they could see. Allen and I clambered 
down the side of the gorge to the river to travel 
up the river bank and learn what chance there 
was of getting the boats through. In the places 
where it was not possible to run the canoes, we 
should have to get foothold along the rocks to 
carry the stuff, and if necessary, the boats, 
as once down in the gorge it would have 
been almost impossible to get the heavy 
canoes up to the heights above, where we 
could travel. The sides of the gorge were pre¬ 
cipitous and more or less choked with blow¬ 
downs and heavy underbrush. It was after sun¬ 
set when we got back and had decided that the 
canoes could be taken through, but that it was 
going to be a sporty bit of work. 
September 17th. After breakfast we took two 
solid loads each a mile and a half to a place 
on the high barrens on the rim of the gorge but 
below the falls, and where there was a game 
trail zigzagging most of the way down to the 
river. It was hot work with the big packs over 
the uneven footing and up-and-down country, 
and our clothes were soon wringing wet. The sides 
of the gorge below the falls were seven or eight 
hundred feet high and most precipitous. We car¬ 
ried the canoes over land half a mile and then 
slid them down over the rocks and bushes, two 
men holding the tow rope to keep them from 
getting away. Often they were perpendicular as 
we lowered them over the side of the gorge. 
Reaching the river we ran down the whirling 
rapids about a mile, had a bite to eat, and then 
climbed to the high barrens above for the loads 
that we had packed over during the morning. 
Started on about 4 o’clock with the inflated air 
beds lashed firmly under the thwarts. This saved 
the loss of some stuff in my canoe, which 
swamped in lowering through a pitch and 
would have capsized without the buoyancy of 
the air bed. Bad prospect for a camp, as there 
was no room at all between the river and the 
cliffs which rcse seven hundred feet on the east¬ 
erly side and one thousand or one thousand two 
hundred feet on the western shore, lined with 
immense blocks of rock that the frost had dis¬ 
lodged from the sides above. There was so 
little space along the shore that when we had 
to get out, which was often, we either stepped 
into water waist-deep among the rocks or had to 
climb thirty or forty feet where the cliffs fell off 
sheer into deep rough water. “Many a chance 
for a fall and slipping off into the deep current, 
and difficult work to follow the shooting canoes 
and watch them so as to handle the rope aright 
and at the same time clamber over boulders and 
ledges.” Just at dusk we noticed some alders 
growing on a little patch of sand, and cutting 
these down, made room for one tent. It was a 
lucky chance, as this was the only possible camp¬ 
ing place we had seen on the river below the 
falls. 
September 18th. Away early on a cold dark 
day that, however, gave us relief from the black 
flies that had been entirely too thick for comfort. 
It was against all rules to have flies so late in 
the year but it was warmer here than up in the 
center of the island. We made fine time for a 
couple of hours as the river had widened and 
was smoother. 
To make the canoes handle better under a pole 
in running down stream, they were loaded so as 
to be down by the bow, just as in coming up 
stream they are loaded with the stern deeper in 
the water, it being almost impossible to handle 
a canoe down stream under a pole if the stern 
is lower than the bow since the water pushes on 
the deeper stern and shoves it across the current 
so that the man with the pole is pushing side¬ 
ways on the boat, with the result that it gets 
away from under him. Bolling and John had 
trouble right here. They were ashore, John 
keeping the canoe off with his pole, while Bolling 
was behind with the line. The canoe was travel¬ 
ing so fast that it was hard to keep up with it 
and give the necessary slack on the rope as needed 
and he may have gotten a little too close, to have 
line enough in hand when it was needed on the 
shoots. Some distance out in the water was a 
boulder that he could not see beyond. As the 
canoe went around outside, he stepped into the 
water to get out on the boulder, but the water 
was deep and it took some seconds; meanwhile 
John was a bit slow in getting out on some rocks 
below. Just then the bow of the canoe struck. 
John called to haul her back up-stream, but Boll¬ 
ing in the deep water behind the boulder was not 
in a position to haul to advantage. The canoe 
at once swung across stream with water pouring 
over her up-stream gunwale, and before we 
could get to her she was breaking in two with 
the down-stream bilge stove in on a rock from 
the steady pressure of the water. Three of us 
were unable to turn her over, for as we heaved 
the ribs broke, the gunwales went, the bags be¬ 
gan to drift out and we had to hustle to save 
them. The small tent, two bags and an aluminum 
pot and pan got away, but the tent and bags 
came ashore in an eddy down stream. 
For a few minutes we were somewhat dis¬ 
mayed by the loss of our best boat, before we 
were out of the gorge and with some twenty 
miles of river to travel before we reached the 
settlement. However, there was nothing to do 
but accept the situation, and we loaded the whole 
outfit into the one leaky old canoe. The stuff 
was thoroughly wet and very heavy, and the old 
boat had all she could do to carry it, in addi¬ 
tion to being partly unloaded every little while 
to bale. There was much to cheer us up, but the 
food supply was now very poor. Had it given 
out altogether, we should have had to take the 
time to climb up out of the gorge and hunt, but 
meat never comes when it is most wanted, and 
The Outfit Spread Out For Drying. 
