This was our first visit to Dawson City! The town is located on the Yukon River. Its claim to fame was being a city of 35,000 gold miners in the late 1800s. That only lasted about two years, but gold mining is still going on in the old tailings.
We knew that when we arrived we were going to have to cross the Yukon River to get to the campground. The only way to cross the river is by ferry....and it isn't a large ferry. Drivers and passengers have to remain in their vehicles during the crossing. There is an area especially for pedestrians and bicyclists.
We are not on this crossing, but wanted you to have an idea of the size of the ferry.
From our campsite in Yukon River Government Campground, we could watch the paddle wheeler cruise the river. This shot is through our screen door.
We had a pull through site right next to the river. Connie and Larry were two sites away, also by the river.
That afternoon, we toured Dawson City and got some of the geocaches put out by the visitor center. The Canadian Park Service is restoring Dawson City to its former glory.
This church was built on permafrost which partially thawed.
One day this building will be restored as the bank.
This is the bar in Bombay Peggy's....a former brothel.
Cheers!
After touring around town, we drove up to Midnight Dome. It is just a mountain that overlooks the city, but at one time it was a gathering place for locals to watch the sunset and sunrise on summer solstice.
The views from the dome were awesome.
We could see islands in the Yukon River that you can't see from town.
Of course there was a great log bench for us to take in the views and have a picture.
From Midnight Dome it off to see Dredge #4. It was the largest dredge used for gold mining in the area.
The next day Bob and I braved the cooler, damp weather to hike to the stern wheeler graveyard. It was only 300 meters from our campsite, but the trail was not well marked and the bushed were wet from the rain we had overnight. Here are the remnants of the first stern wheeler we found.
Then we rounded a corner....well, actually we walked on the ribs of another stern wheeler and we found quite a few more!
They were lined up along the shore, three deep and in various stages of rot.
One still had the frames for its paddles.
We enjoyed our hike, even though our shoes and pants legs got soaked. And yes, we found the geocache located near the wrecks.
After changing clothes we walked to the ferry to cross over to Dawson City. I wanted to visit the log cabin used by Jack London. This is not the cabin, somehow we only got a picture of the museum. Oh, well, I enjoyed the museum and learned that the cabin only has the logs from the top half of the original cabin, the logs for the lower half are in a cabin in California near Jack London's home.
We thoroughly enjoyed our first trip to Dawson City, but it was time to get back on the road....Top of World Highway is our next adventure!
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