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Show agreed place . ( R . 4457-61 , Vol 133 . 25 . ) After getting my boat , , I continued on down the river to the mouth of Grand Gulch . This was in December . ( R . 4463 , Vol . 25 . . ) In September , 1905 , I saw Messrs . Calhoun and Clay with their boats at Bluff City , to which point they had come from somewhere above . I later saw them at my camp down the river and they continued on down the river from there with their boats and supplies . ( R . 4461-3 , Vol . 25 . ) In 1909 1 went from Chinle Creek down to Mexican Hat with another miner and we took with us in our boat seven or eight hundred pounds of supplies . ( R . 4463-4 , Vol . 25 . ) Beside the trips I have detailed , I have made other boat trips up and downstream ; I have traveled both up and downstream over the section of the San Juan River between the mouth of Chinle Creek and a point close to ( Honaker's Honakers ) Trail . I made a boat trip from ( Zahn's Zahns ) Camp up to Gable bar . In going upstream we would row and pole our boats and sometimes would tow the boat at a riffle . I would estimate that I have seen probably twenty separate parties go down the river in their boats from Bluff ; I have seen eight or ten parties pass our camp just below Chinle Wash in addition to the parties I have seen at Bluff . Most of my trips have been made in the fall , winter and early spring months ; placer miners do not work much during high water ; until the water gets low the bars are covered up . . ( R . 4464-5 , Vol . 25 . ) I would say that the minimum depth of the channel of the river as I have seen it at Chinle Creek and points below was about 3 feet . I have encountered difficulties with sand bars which I have encountered when we came out of ( a- a ) box canyon into a large open space where there would be a sand bar dividing the stream ; unless we were careful ( w'e we ) were very liable to run our boats up on the sand at ( such -such such ) places , and it would take something like fifteen minutes to get off ; this ( wouldn't wouldnt ) happen often . I have always been able to find a channel . ( R . 4466-7 , Vol . 25 . ) 1 always could make better progress going upstream by poling than by rowing . There is some swift water in the San Juan River but I was able to negotiate those rapids with my boat ; the greatest length of any rapid water which I encountered was probably a hundred yards . ( R . 4468 , Vol . 25 . ) When I first went in there to placer mine I took a team and wagon and kept them there all the time and |