Heading south, slowly

July 27, 2009
Dawson City, Yukon Territory, Canada

Don't forget: you can click on any picture thumbnail to see the full-sized image...

Today, we left Alaska and entered the Yukon Territory of Canada. We definitely know we're on the way "home" at this point. We may (or may not) dip back into Alaska once or twice on the way back, as the southeastern part of the state hugs the coast just west of British Columbia. We might make the side trip of several days down to Haines and Skagway, and we might visit the small town of Hyder further south. On the other hand, we might not, since we're both feeling a bit of "tourism overload". Part of me wants to see everything there is to see, and another part says "enough, already - let's get back to the lower 48 in time to have a break for a week before we do the wine country caravan". Not sure what plan will win out - stay tuned!

Today's drive took a lot out of me: 6+ hours of essentially gravel. Two hands on the wheel time! It was beautiful country, though, following the Taylor Highway from Chicken, then the Top of the World Highway (you can see why they call it that in the picture above) to the Alaska/Yukon border and on to Dawson City, a total of just over 100 miles. Dust? You bet!

We had the quickest Border crossing ever:

"How many passengers"? "Two, plus two dogs".

"Do you have firearms"? "No".

"How long will you be in Canada"? "Two to three weeks as we transit to Washington State".

"Have a nice day and a safe trip".

I'm sure our return to the US won't be so simple.

We saw all of 4 vehicles traveling in our direction all day, so a) we're out in the boonies and b) the summer is winding down. We did have a little fun on the drive, though. Soon after we left Chicken, we met a couple of RVs heading the other way. Both were moving fast and had caravan signs in the windows, with the lead vehicle designated as "Staff", probably the caravan leader. We'd explored the idea of joining a caravan when we were planning the trip and decided against, primarily because we wanted to spend as much time as we needed in each place, not be driven by a schedule. So, we knew that there were a bunch of caravans leaving Washington or BC in early July, and that their route did the "loop" opposite from ours (they head for Fairbanks first, then Denali, Anchorage, the Kenai, and back to Tok and the Alaska Highway).

Anyway, being a good citizen, I slowed and pulled over to let them pass (we're on a two lane wide gravel road at this point, but why throw a bunch of dust and rocks at them). Pretty soon, we came upon the second batch of the caravan, moving slowly toward us. From a short distance away, I could see that the first RV was weaving wildly from side to side and moving slowly, and had accumulated a queue of about 8 vehicles behind, including a couple of cars and a tractor-trailer. I pulled over as far as I could and came to a full stop to let them pass. Apparently, the guy in the first RV was trying to avoid every pothole and rock in the road, and screwing up progress in the process. I waved and smiled to everyone as they went past. Funny, the people in each vehicle going by were a little less friendly and enthusiastic than the one before them, especially the trucker. I just smiled and waved. After a few minutes we were back under way, thinking "glad that's over".

Well, not so fast, buckaroo. We were almost to the border, maybe 45 minutes later when I saw the dreaded orange signs: "Road Work Ahead", "Be Prepared To Stop". Well, how bad could it be? Around the next bend, after the road narrowed to about 1.5 good lanes, I came upon a road grader moving slowly in the distance. I figured that this was a good sign, as maybe the road ahead would be smoother. Well, not so much. This guy was clearing the water troughs on the side of the road, with the blade at a 45 degree angle and the curb-side wheels down in the ditch. He was pushing a pile of gravel about 2' high and 2' wide up onto the roadway. Hmmm, I wonder if he has someone trailing him and clearing that up? My answer was around the next curve: Nope.

I came face-to-face with the rest of the caravan, about 10 rigs driving down the middle of the road next to the grader guy's mess of gravel, rocks, roots, and debris. The first guy started having a coronary and stopped dead in his tracks, then made his "navigator" get out and wave her arms. I couldn't tell if she was waving at me or "hubby", so I just stayed put for a minute or so. After a bit of a stand-off (none of us wanted to back up, since you can't do that with a vehicle being towed "4-down" as it'll jackknife almost instantly), the oncoming traffic all started to creep forward and to the right, crowding up on top of the gravel debris. At least they had solid road under the pile; all I had was a 2' deep ditch.

Finally, I saw the "tail gunner" of the caravan (an experienced hand, assigned to bring up the rear and make sure nobody gets lost) waving me forward. I slowly crept past the group, keeping my mirror about 2-3" from the side of each rig. At one point, I felt my right front tire start to slip into the ditch, but was able to catch it in time. After about 5 minutes of them shifting right and me creeping along, we cleared the group. I thanked the tail gunner as I went by, and was immediately kicking myself for not taking pictures (Geri was in the back, not having fun), but this was definitely the time for focus on the road. (Get it? Focus? Pictures? Oh, well.)

We stopped for lunch and a break just before Dawson City, and took the opportunity to get our bearings after the long drive. The rest area was decorated with faux gold rush buildings, which was clever. The interpretive signs at the site spoke about the diminished caribou herd that used to roam in the area, along the Forty Mile River. As late as the 1920s, there were over 500,000 caribou in the herd. They were hunted almost to extinction (these are specialized "barren land caribou", apparently), but are making a slow comeback. The signs at the overlook propose that there will be a great view of them "someday". In the meantime, the overlook is so overgrown with brush that there could be caribou in the valley below and we'd never know it!




Our next adventure was getting to Dawson City itself. Dawson City is a fairly compact gold rush-era town on the banks of the Yukon River. On the east bank of the river. As in, on the other side of the river. Over which there are no bridges in this area. But wait, there's a free ferry! Runs 24 hours a day. Excellent!

After a long descent from the Top of the World Highway to the river level, we got in queue for the ferry. There were about 5 cars already in line (where they came from I have no idea, since none of them passed us on the TotWH). There's a sign indicating maximum vehicle length of 83+ feet (what happened to the whole metric thing?), so we knew we were OK. They took the cars on board and made us wait for the next trip, but it's only 10 minutes so we relaxed a bit. Actually, I got out and looked around under the coach, since we picked up a screeching noise in the front end coming down the hill, which must have been a small rock caught in the disc brakes on the front. The ferry arrived and we slowly loaded on, dragging the tow bar a bit but none the worse for wear. It's always interesting to cross a fast-moving river on these small ferries, since it's pretty easy to feel like you're being swept downstream. And, as we learned yesterday, "downstream" in this case is almost 1,000 miles to the Bering Sea. Anyway, the pilot did a good job of aiming far enough upstream that we vectored back to the proper point on the other shore and were soon on our way through town.

Dawson City looks exactly like I'd expect a gold rush town to look: newer than the "old west" from movies and TV but all multi-colored wooden buildings and gravel streets laid out in a nice grid. We decided that we'll stay a few days and explore the town and the area, which still thrives on gold fever, these days aimed at the tourist trade.