Particular attention was paid to the loading of the boats the next morning.  The moving-picture film was tucked in the toes of our sleeping bags, and the protecting bags were carefully laced.  We were not going to take any chances in this next plunge—­the much-talked-of entrance to the granite gorge.  A half-hour’s run and a dash through one violent rapid landed us at the end of the Hance Trail—­unused for tourist travel for several years—­with a few torn and tattered tents back in the side canyon down which the trail wound its way.  We half hoped that we would find some of the prospectors who make this section their winter home either at the Tanner or the Hance Trail, but there was no sign of recent visitors at either place, unless it was the numerous burro tracks in the sand.  These tracks were doubtless made by some of the many wild burros that roam all the lower plateaus in the upper end of the Grand Canyon.

After a careful inspection of the Hance Rapid we were glad the signal fire was not built.  It was a nasty rapid.  While reading over our notes one evening we were amused to find that we had catalogued different rapids with an equal amount of fall as “good,” “bad,” or “nasty,” the difference depending nearly altogether on the rocks in the rapids.  The “good rapids” were nothing but a descent of “big water,” with great waves,—­for which we cared little, but rather enjoyed if it was not too cold,—­and with no danger from rocks; the “bad rapids” contained rocks, and twisting channels, but with half a chance of getting through.  A nasty rapid was filled with rocks, many of them so concealed in the foam that it was often next to impossible to tell if rocks were there or not, and in which there was little chance of running through without smashing a boat.  The Hance Rapid was such a one.

Such a complication of twisted channels and protruding rocks we had not seen unless it was at Hell’s Half Mile.  It meant a portage—­nothing less—­the second since leaving that other rapid in Lodore.  So we went to work, carrying our duffle across deep, soft sand-dunes, down to the middle of the rapid, where quieted for a hundred yards before it made the final plunge.  The gathering dusk of evening found all material and one boat at this spot, with the other one at the head of the rapid, to be portaged the next day.  But we did not portage this boat.  A good night’s rest, and the safeguard of a boat at the bottom of the plunge made it look much less dangerous, and five minutes after breakfast was finished, this boat was beside its mate, and we had a reel of film which we hoped would show just how we successfully ran this difficult rapid.  While going over the second section, on the opposite side of the river, Emery was thrown out of his boat for an instant when the Edith touched a rock in a twenty-five mile an hour current, similar to my first upset in the Soap Creek Rapid—­the old story:  out again; in again; on again—­landing in safety at the end of the rapid not one whit the worse for the spill.