There are three trails leading into the canon and down to the river, the Bright Angel, Grand View and Hance trails, which are at intervals of eight and twelve miles apart. They are equally interesting and comparatively safe if the trip is made on the back of a trained pony or burro with a competent guide.
The Hance trail is a loop and is twenty miles long. It is seven miles down to the river, six miles up the stream and seven miles back to the rim. It was built single handed by Captain John Hance, who has lived many years in the canon. The trail is free to pedestrians, but yields the captain a snug income from horse hire and his own services as guide for tourists who go over the trail.
Captain Hance is an entertaining raconteur and he spins many interesting yarns for the amusement, if not the edification, of his guests. The serious manner in which he relates his stories makes it sometimes hard to tell whether be is in jest or earnest.
His acknowledged skill in mountaineering, and felicity in romancing has won for him more than a local reputation and the distinguished title of Grand Canon Guide and Prevaricator.
He relates how "once upon a time" he pursued a band of mountain sheep on the rim of the canon. Just as he was about to secure his quarry the sheep suddenly turned a short corner and disappeared behind some rocks. Before he realized his danger he found himself on the brink of a yawning abyss and under such a momentum that he could not turn aside or stop his horse.
Together they went over the cliff in an awful leap. He expected to meet instant death on the rocks below and braced himself for the shock. As the fall was greater than usual, being over a mile deep in a perpendicular line, it required several seconds for the descending bodies to traverse the intervening space, which gave him a few moments to think and plan some way of escape. At the critical moment a happy inspiration seized and saved him. On the instant that his horse struck the rock and was dashed to pieces, the captain sprang nimbly from the saddle to his feet unharmed.
To prove the truth of his statement he never misses an opportunity to point out to the tourist the spot where his horse fell, and shows the white bones of his defunct steed bleaching in the sun.
At Moran's Point there is a narrow cleft in the rocks which he calls the Fat Woman's Misery. It received its name several years ago from a circumstance that happened while he was conducting a party of tourists along the rim trail. To obtain a better view the party essayed to squeeze through the opening, in which attempt all succeeded except one fat women who stuck fast. After vainly trying to extricate her from her uncomfortable position he finally told her that there was but one of two things to do, either remain where she was and starve to death or take one chance in a thousand of being blown out alive by dynamite. After thinking a moment she decided to try the one chance in a thousand" experiment.
A charge of dynamite was procured and the fuse lighted. After the explosion he returned to the spot and found the result satisfactory. The blast had released the woman, who was alive and sitting upon a rock. He approached her cheerfully and said:
"Madam, how do you feel?" She looked up shocked, but evidently very much relieved, and replied "Why, sir, I feel first rate, but the jolt gave me a little toothache."He tells another story of how he once took a drink from the Colorado river. The water is never very clear in the muddy stream but at that particular time it was unusually murky. He had nothing with which to dip the water and lay down on the bank to take a drink. Being very thirsty he paid no attention to the quality of the water, but only knew that it tasted wet. The water, however, grew thicker as he drank until it became balled up in his mouth, and stuck fast in his throat and threatened to choke him. He tried to bite it off but failed because his teeth were poor. At last becoming desperate, he pulled his hunting knife from his belt and cut himself loose from his drink.
Different theories have been advanced to account for the origin of the Grand Canon, but it is a question whether it is altogether due to any one cause. Scientists say that it is the work of water erosion, but to the layman it seems impossible. If an ocean of water should flow over rocks during eons of ages it does not seem possible that it could cut such a channel.
