Relaxing and poking around Dawson City
Cathy and I had 3 nights (July 31st and August 1st and 2nd) and 2 full days to explore the Dawson area. We didn’t have any plans, but saw a little bit of a lot, and spent a lot of time just relaxing at the Yukon River Campground in West Dawson.
We were in campsite #42, a large pull-through right on the Yukon River.
The view of the river from the campsite was good, but a short trail from the campsite leads to the riverbank. Peregrine falcons and gulls nest on those cliffs. We saw gulls constantly, but no falcons.
Our first destination was the Midnight Dome, on Monday night (July 31st). This was the view down the Yukon River from the 887-meter (2,911-foot) summit at 7:35 pm.
Looking over Dawson City and up the Yukon River.
We watching a hang-glider prepare his gear and launch, and a few minute slater, land on the waterfront park in downtown Dawson. We had just missed his previous launch which resulted almost immediately in a spectacular crash into the top of a tree. Apparently only his pride was injured 🙂
We finished our evening with a walk along the river dyke. The city has done a great job making this pile of gravel into a lovely, people-friendly place. This photo was taken at 8:50 pm, just before the sun dipped behind the mountain to the west.
On Tuesday afternoon we took the free ferry back across the river again. Our first destination was the Bonanza Creek Road. Both Claim #6, where you can pan for gold for free, and Dredge No. 4, seen in the photo, were very busy.
The cemeteries above Dawson City were our next stop. We took a walk through the upper part of St. Mary’s Catholic Cemetery.
There are many babies and children in the cemetery. Catherine Mary A. MacDonald died on August 31, 1905, at the age of 2 years, 6 months.
It was very warm, and Cathy wanted to find a shady spot to walk, but I made a short stop to pay my respects at the grave of my late friend Ken Spotswood, in the YOOP Cemetery (Yukon Order of Pioneers).
The skies were threatening as we crossed the Yukon River back to the campground at 3:20, but the rain never arrived.
We went back into Dawson Tuesday night, for a fabulous dinner at our favourite restaurant, The Drunken Goat Taverna. We shared the Poikilia, which is an assortment of Greek specialities – lamb chops, Greek style ribs, chicken breast, garides, spanakopita, tiropita, pita bread with feta dip, and a Greek salad. It’s a bit spendy at $77.95 (which seems like a huge increase since the last time we had it), but it’s best as a meal for 4, so we took plenty of leftovers back to the RV!
On Wednesday morning, the situation at the Dawson side of the ferry was a mess. Two RV caravans were trying to get to the Top of the World Highway, and it apparently hadn’t occurred to anybody in those caravans to assign times for each rig. We talked to one woman who drove the couple’s “toad” (the towed car) across and then waited for more than 4 hours for her husband to get across.
We certainly weren’t going to take a ferry, so headed up the Top of the World Highway. This was the view ahead at Km 30.
We went to the summit, a few hundred meters from the Alaska border, then headed southwest on an old mining road that goes into the Sixty Mile gold mining area. I hadn’t been on the road since I came out on it when I was working on the gold dredge that’s now a tourist attraction in Skagway (I was researching its history for the new owner).
This is spectacular country, with ghosts everywhere. Almost every valley bottom has been mined over the past 120 years.
The road got too small and rough for comfort after about half an hour, so we headed back to the highway. The next photo shows the Canada/USA (Yukon/Alaska) border crossing.
Looking down the Top of the World Highway from the summit towards Dawson as we started back down, at 1:20 pm.
By 4:00 most of the RVs had made it across the ferry, so we went back into Dawson to visit the Dawson City Firefighters Museum. Did we ever luck in – their freshly-restored steam fire engine had just been unloaded from the shipping container!
The quality of the restoration of this 1898 Clapp & Jones steam pump is absolutely superb. I expect that this is the finest example of its type in the world now. The restoration was done by Stan Uher of Classic Coachworks in Bleinheim, Ontario. It took over 1,400 hours and 18 months to complete. The cost was $250,000, of which some $50,000 was for nickel plating. Many of these steam pumps are now copper – once the nickel/corroded nickel has ben stripped off, it’s just too expensive to re-do. Most of the money for the restoration came from Dawson’s volunteer firefighters donating the stipends they get for attending fires, for several years. To me, that says a lot about Dawson, and is a significant part of the story.
I went around and around, over and under this magnificent machine, and the quality is consistently perfect.
It wasn’t possible to restore the fire engine to operating status, as parts of the boiler such as the water sight glass seen in the next photo don’t meet current standards.
This painting on the wall hints at what the steam pump would have looked like in operation. It must have been very impressive.
After the Firefighters Museum, we went to the Visitor Information Centre so I could use the wifi, and get another look at the incredibly detailed model of the Klondike Mines Railway that’s pretty much hidden in a back room (temporarily, I hope).
I often don’t realize that Cathy has never seen sights that I’ve been to many times. The Sternwheeler Graveyard is one of those places, so after having dinner at our campsite, we walked down the riverbank to see it.
Before leaving the campground on Thursday morning, I walked around the entire campground taking photos for my campground guide. There’s a huge variation in the quality of campsites – some are quite awful (tight and very un-level), while others have great character, such as this terraced pull-through one on the upper level.
The riverfront sites are all very nice, ranging from tenting sights such as the one in the next photo, to large pull-throughs such as the one we were in.
Just after 11:30, we boarded the ferry for the last time, and after a bit of grocery shopping, headed north towards Tombstone Territorial Park.
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