Wednesday, June 29, 2011

June 26 - Whitehorse to Dawson City, Yukon Territory

We left Whitehorse fairly early and headed up the highway. Just 10 miles or so was our turnoff to go up to Dawson City on the Klondike Highway. The plan was to stay in Dawson City and then ride the Top Of The World highway the next day to Alaska. 

The Klondike highway is not as traveled as the Alaska Highway so it is like a county highway compared to a state highway - no centerline in places, no shoulders in places, more bends and winds thru the countryside. Again, it was a mostly uneventful ride thru monotonous pine forests with an occasional small village. 


We rode for several hours and came upon the Braeburn Lodge. We had not eaten breakfast and I knew what was in store there. 


We stopped and went inside for one of their famous cinnamon rolls. They are huge!! They are also $8.50! So we split one, and as it turned out that was our breakfast and the only food we would have until dinner that night. 



We encountered a number of class A motorhomes all towing nice vehicles (F-150 pickup, Lexus SUV, etc). In chatting with a few at some photo stops they were part of a sponsored trip of 22 class A motorhomes from all over the US. Great people to talk to but we passed those great lumbering leviathans many times over the next couple of days. 

Interesting side story - As we pulled out of a gas station stop I noticed two continuous skid marks out of the gas station and going up the road. After about a half a mile sat one of the monster class A motorhomes with a car behind it. Down the road we stopped at a scenic overlook and chatted with one of the motorhomes people. They told us that the "power unit" (or something like that) had failed on that motorhome and had locked up his drive wheels (front wheels?). They had pulled the car a half mile down the road before the driver noticed it. What kind of power must those things have??? Anyway, it ground all the way through the rubber and into the rims. So not only did they have to sit there and wait for 2 new tires but they had to get wheels to match the car. I wonder how long THAT took!

The only bear we saw that day was a large black bear slowly walking in front of one of those motorhomes who had stopped for it. The bear was slowly making his way across the road and was not the least disturbed or curious about us. 

As we got close to Dawson City it started to rain. We rode into town and we greeting by frontier era buildings of pubs, cafes, general store, etc that look like they were out of an old movie.


We needed to get out of the rain and consider our options, so we stopped in front of a large, interesting place called "Diamond Tooth Gerties."  It was an old dancing and gambling hall and we learned the only currently operating gambling establishment in the YT. We went inside and got a beer and watch some blackjack tables. Very rustic inside. One of the security guys told us it was built in 1901. Do a Google search for "Arctic Brotherhood" and Dawson City and you will find some history. 

One of the waitresses was an attractive young girl in a period costume - full fancy dancing hall dress with a large white feather sticking up in the back of her hair. We just had to get picture so we asked her and she said sure happens all the time. 


It finally stopped raining so we went to the General Store then drove to one of the RV parks but their tent camping was on gravel and right beside a bunch of RVs so THAT wouldn't work.

Then we drove back down the road a mile or so to another RV park. But they didn't have an power so their free wifi didn't work. So we decided we would rather stay in a nice looking government campsite about 6 miles south (right across from the Dawson airport). Lots of tall trees with a pavilion and bear boxes around. Probably half a dozen RVs in there scattered around, couple of bikers that we had passed during the day.

So we set up our tents and went over to the pavilion. The mosquitoes were out in force! OMG they were in clouds around us. I put on my headnet (thank God I had one! Sandy had one too). Put my 100% Deet spray on my hands and that seemed to work well. Never have I seen mosquitoes that thick (we were next to the river).

Got my headnet on and bearspray in my hand - good to go!

I got out my little jetboil stove and a couple of Mountain House freeze dried meals. Sandy had never had one before and we impressed with it. Tasted good and was satisfying. I wanted to cook and eat in the pavilion since it was a hundred yards or so from where we had set up. So any food odor and the trash was over by those other bikers' campsite and not ours!

Then it started to rain again so we just sat and talked for a while. The rain didn't let up so we finally about 10 pm walked back over to our tents and went to bed. It rained all night long.  Fortunately the rain stopped in the morning for us to break our tents down and load up.