Two miles above the head of the canyon, the power of the Explorer was matched against a stiff current that came swirling around the base of a perpendicular rock one hundred feet high.

With the steam pressure then on, she was not equal to the encounter and made no advance, whereupon she was headed for a steep bank to allow the men to leap ashore with a line and tow her beyond the opposition.

Above, the current was milder, but the river spread out to such an extent that progress was exceedingly difficult, and Ives expresses a fear that this might prove the head of navigation, yet he must then have been aware (and certainly was when he published his report) that Johnson at that very moment was far beyond this with a steamer larger than the one he was on.

It was now January 17, 1858, and it was on January 23d, that Johnson was at the point where Beale intended to cross.

The steamer was used as a ferry and then left the same day for Yuma.