June 2016 – On the road with Jim

Dawson City – Yukon

It figures! Of all the towns that we’ve visited in Canada so far, the one that I liked the best is our last. Well, Dawson is the kind of town tailor-made for tourist . . . sort of like Tombstone or Jerome in Arizona, but with more than one street. There’s a good mix of new and old. Shops, restaurants, and exhibits are distributed throughout the town. The streets aren’t paved and board walks keep pedestrians boots out of the mud.

Theater House and Hostle — Dawson City takes pride in maintaining its historic buildings and makes sure new buildings fit into the period.

Because it’s situated on the Yukon River, it served as a supply and shipping depot for gold rush minors. Stern-wheelers would bring supplies and people up from Whitehorse and the mines would send gold and silver ore in return. It’s one of the last places you can catch a paddle-wheeler for a river cruise.

You get the sense that the merchants play all of their cards. One of the department stores we visited looked like a normal tourist trap, with trinkets and tee shirts up front, but towards the back were household goods and appliances. When the tourists disappear, the locals get you through the winter.

Probably the iconic Kissing Houses is the post card shot with which you are most familiar. I can testify the buildings still stand in 2016, well over a century later. There are several structures like them in town. They lean because the builders placed the heated building’s foundations directly on the permafrost. The buildings warmth melted the ice and then the footings sank. Today’s building codes prevent damage like this.

Jack London's Cabin — Deb views the inside of Jack London’s cabin. Restorers moved the cabin 80 miles to Dawson after discovering it up river.

Tucked way back in the town are the cabins of Robert Service and Jack London. They weren’t neighbors because London’s era was in the 19th century while Service didn’t live here for another 20 years. Actually Jack London’s cabin is a replica discovered 80 miles away. Historians reconstructed it using some of the original logs while a duplicate cabin in California has the rest of the logs.

We had a good day here and we’ll be leaving via the river ferry to the ‘Top of the World Highway’. It got its name because it follows the ridge-lines. We’ll spend tomorrow night in Chicken, Alaska; a three building town that has more chicken puns than the world needs. I wonder if we’ll eat at KFC.

PS: As I publish this post, the time is 10:44pm, and the sun has not gone down.

Bonanza Creek – Yukon

A couple of days ago, my friend Jeff wrote in a post comment that he had noticed strange snake-like formations along each side of the road near Dawson City, and he wondered if I could find out what they were. As you drive into Dawson, it’s obvious what he was talking about, because they’re everywhere. When he asked, I thought I would just reply with an answer, but since these ‘strange’ formation are an interesting part of the Yukon history, I’ll turn it into a full post.

The formations that he noticed are huge piles of river rock and they make ten foot mounds. The tops of the piles have and undulating pattern and they sweep back and forth. Some of them are newer with no vegetation growing, while others are already covered with trees.

Dredge Piles — The piles of river rocks are the tailing of a placer mining dredge.

The piles are simply river bottom dredged from the creek bottom and piled along the bank. It was one of these contraptions that made these piles:

Dredge No. 4 worked the Bonanza Creek until operations stopped. It’s now undergoing full restoration at its last place.

This is the No. 4 Dredge on Bonanza Creek and is under going full restoration. During the short placer mining season a crew of four would run one of these babies twenty-four hours a day. The would dredge up the bottom and sides of rivers, process the load on board, then dump the tailing out the other side. When they ran, they could fill up a normal dump truck every three seconds. At the height of the gold rush, there were twenty-seven of these eight story monsters running at the same time.

Crews positioned them at the mouth of a water-way and they would work their way upstream. Before they could start work, all the vegetation was stripped from the land. If you lived in the way, you were out of luck, because mineral rights trumped property rights. Then the permafrost had to me melted, by pumping steam into the ground. Finally the dredge would crawl its way up the creek at a rate of a foot a day.

Strip mining at it’s best, Ah? The units were 95% efficient, so the area is still crawling with miners working active claims. Fred and I visited the original claim today, which is a park called the Discover Claim, and wondered if any gold was left. We both doubted it, but picked up a shiny rock in the creek anyway.

Carmacks – Yukon Terratories

Our drive to Carmacks today was an easy one. It wasn’t too far, the roads were all in good shape and there weren’t any steep passes. As it happens, we were in our camp and setting up in time for lunch.

There isn’t much of a town, a couple of stores and a gas station along with the RV Park we’re in. There is a bit of history about the town and the person it was named after. George Washington Carmack was a miner who explored the Yukon and found a vein of coal near here. His great fame came later when he discovered the gold nugget that set off the Klondike Gold Rush and the Klondike Gold Field between here and Dawson.

The Yukon River Above Carmacks — The Yukon River makes a sweeping S curve through the town of Carmacks.

The country is beautiful and the Yukon River flows north until it makes a couple of sweeping bends around the town before heading north again. We had time to stop and read the roadside information signs and they explained that the mountains are formed from conglomerate rock. Like concrete it’s made up of smaller rock glued together with mud (instead of cement). Part of the mountains sloughed off creating a formation called the Whitehorse Trough and the highway runs its length.

Downstream from here is a rapids called Five Finger Rapids. There are four large formations of these conglomerate rock in the river and since they’re more resistant to erosion, they’ve created a fall in the river. To get the steamboats through the rapids, engineers had to build a cable and wench system to haul the boats up and down.

Since our back door is on the Yukon, Fred and I got in some fishing before dinner. We finally landed something. I caught an Arctic Grayling and a White Fish, while Fred landed two more Grayling. I feel a lot better about all the new fishing equipment now that we’ve actually caught something.

Yukon River – Yukon Terratories

This was our last full day in Whitehorse. Fred and I tried to fish the Yukon River and got skunked again this morning, but we each had a strike, or at least that’s what we told each other. The rest of the day we stocked up with needed staples then did a little sightseeing.

While we played tourist yesterday, we never got to the town’s biggest museum piece, so we made a point to stop at the paddle-wheeler Klondike in the afternoon. It is the riverboat hauled ore and supplies between Dawson City and Whitehorse on the Yukon River. It’s a huge ship with two 450hp steam engines and it took half of a forest to fuel the boiler.

The Klondike Paddle-wheeler. — Anne checks out the Klondike paddle wheel riverboat.

Going down stream it took more than a day with one stop for wood, but coming back to Whitehorse against the current the trip was over four days with as many refueling stops. As you would expect the ship is in mint condition with era specific supply boxes and simulated bags of silver stacked neatly in the cargo hold. Since we were second class passengers we didn’t get to see the first class cabins or the wheelhouse. That would have interested me.

The Klondike Galley — The galley of the Klondike is stocked with plates and cookware from its era.

Back at camp, I had to go look at the WWII era military vehicles lined up beside the entrance. I’m not certain if these were used for the construction of the Alaska/Canada Highway or not, but as with Route 66 kitsch at home, any memorabilia that can tie in with the theme is helpful. There are about five on display and although they’re not restored, they really aren’t in bad shape. I’m sure they could be used in a collection somewhere instead of yard art along the road.

WWII Trucks as Yard Art — Our campgrounds has five different 40s era military vehicles lining the driveway for decoration.

Tomorrow, we’re going to make a side trip off of the Alaska Highway and head north to Dawson City. That’s the other big town in the Yukon and it is highly recommended. It’s also the home of author Jack London, whom I read as a lad. On the same street is the cabin of Robert Service, Yukon’s famous poet.

We’re going to break the trip up by making a stop midway in a town called Carmacks, a small town on the banks of the Yukon River. Then on to Dawson City for a couple of days. After that we will be in . . . (ta-DA!) Alaska after almost a month of traveling.

Whitehorse – Yukon Territories

Finally, we’ve made it to Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon Territories. I know this is hard to believe but, TV was invented before my formative years and one of the shows my family would watch was Sergeant Preston of the Yukon. “On King! On you huskies!” (That’s all kind of weird now because if he had a horse (Rex), so what did he need a dog sled for? And, how do you pick one of eight dogs as a favorite and not piss off the rest?). The show was transported from the radio shows of the 40’s. At the time, it was high adventure and we didn’t question authority.

Today we explored Whitehorse and hard as I tried, I didn’t see anyone dressed in the iconic Red Mounties uniform. Nary a one was in sight; only men and women dressed in blue, driving RCMP vehicles. Disappointed, we returned to camp to drown our sorrows, then Janet and Tim, another Casita couple we’ve met along our journey, showed us a photo of her posing with . . . yes, Sergeant Preston. It was taken at the gay pride festival held in the downtown park . . . and we missed it. I’m devastated.

Whitehorse Inn Neon Sign — Of all of the iconic signs that would represent this town, the one I found was hanging in the local museum.

Compared to our recent stops, Whitehorse is a big city . . . well, a city big enough to support 22,000 residents. They even have a commercial airport. I can verify this because our camp is at the end of the runway. Fortunately only two 737s come in and leave each day, one in the morning and one in the evening. There aren’t many glamour shops, but you can probably get any thing you need here, except a starter relay for a Mercedes-Benz.

Whitehorese Fifth and Main — Although small, various merchants to support tourism from summer travailing to winter’s Aurora sightseers’ needs.

It’s located along the Yukon River which is either the third or fourth largest (depends upon your source) drainage system in North America. Even this far from the sea, the water flows with enough volume that all of Arizona could be turned into a golf course with the amount of water flowing by the old riverboat dock each day.

Yellow House — In downtown Whitehorse, there are new buildings next to very old homes, This homes owner hasn’t quite restored the yellow paint.

The architecture is a mix of new functional boxes mixed with rustic homes and shops, so there is are historic and new buildings, something that I’ve missed in the last couple of towns we’ve stayed. There is a real art community shown by murals depicting historic scenes on buildings. My second art clue is that the a lot of the historic sites restored to ‘like new’ or better condition. That takes a lot of resources that, I imagine a town this size couldn’t afford without a strong volunteer organization.

The last thing that I expected to see on a Saturday afternoon was to see a perfect 57 Dodge driving down the street. It’s like being in Cuba.

For a town this size, there are a lot of good restaurants. Last night, we chose the top pick from TripAdvisor.com called Klondike Rib and Salmon BBQ. I don’t really want to do reviews in this blog, but it’s worth a mention. Good ribs yes, but you can get them anywhere. BBQ salmon . . . let’s put it this way; Queen Anne hates fish and her top hate is salmon. We split the ribs and salmon dish (their special) and I made her try a bite. She didn’t finish her ribs and asked to try more of my salmon. That’s strong testimony. Well recommended, but expect a line out the door if you come.

Fred and I are still tied at zip apiece, so tomorrow we’re going to toss lines at the Yukon River. With that flow, I don’t expect to have much luck, but what the heck; it beats doing laundry.