At times some of the men amused themselves by diving under the boats, swimming around and ahead of them, or surprised a coyote on the bank with a rifle-shot, and otherwise enjoyed the relaxation we had well earned by our toil in Red Canyon.

The river was smooth and deep and about six hundred to eight hundred feet wide.

At the very foot of the valley we made a camp under the shadow of that magnificent and unrivalled portal, the Gate of Lodore, which had been visible to us for many miles; the dark cleft two thousand feet high, through which the river cuts into the heart of the mountains, appearing as solemn and mysterious as the pathway to another world.

From an eminence we could peer into its depths for some distance, and there was no sign of a rapid, but we were not deceived, having posted ourselves by extracts from Jack Sumner's diary, whose description of "how the waters come down at Lodore" was contained in the frequent repetition of the words, "a hell of foam." Lodore, indeed, is almost one continuous rapid for the whole twenty miles of its length, and the passage through it will tax the endurance of any man.

The declivity is the greatest of the whole river with the exception of the First Granite Gorge of the Grand Canyon and a portion of Cataract Canyon.