Saturday, June 28, 2014

Dawson City & Top of the World Hwy 6/28/2014

On the road again Saturday June 28
 Irma, Amos, Lorraine & Leon:  Our dear "new" friends from Pennsylvania found us.  So good to visit again.  Actually saw Lorraine yesterday.  We really enjoy visiting with them.
An endurance canoe/kayak race was ending in Dawson City.  65 teams started on Wed. in Whitehorse.  Some finished on Friday but we missed them coming in.  Glad to see a team finish.  Whew.
 Dawson City Museum was excellent.  A great film by a son of the original prospectors.



 Memorabilia of the mining equipment.

First pan for sifting the larger rocks.  Then 2nd pan for finer sifting.

Interesting doorstop.
 
 First bank was opened in 1898.
 Excellent demonstration of sifting the gold.  Step one.
 Step 2 to wash.  Gold heavier so will settle to bottom.
 Still working to find it, swirling & washing.  Water was a premium so they kept using it over & over.
 They put the flakes in a machine that heated it.  It was poured in a form and here is a piece of gold!!!
 Heading out of town.

 For our ferry ride across the Yukon River.
 Bulldozer leveling the land zone.  Mmmh!
 Tom and Linda's vehicle off the ferry.
 Driving the Top of the World Highway.  The valleys are immense.  Photos just can't portray it all.
 A truck traveling the road in front of the snow.
Back in the U.S.A.

 One lane road!!!!  And I think this was the spot where there were BIG puddles.  We talked to people who drove this road when it was raining.  Very hard to see and the ground gets slick.  So grateful we had a beautiful day to travel.
It's getting very dusty.  We are happy to be behind a caravan.  Just take our time.  Got to 9 mph at one point. We have to be far enough behind to not drive in their dust or rocks they would kick up.
 And then the truckers come barreling by!  Cringe.  But all's ok.
 I really don't know if it was harder to be the driver or passenger.  I offered to drive but Phil wanted to drive.....or not be the passenger.  Actually the hardest part of the road was in the U.S.  The first 8 miles were huge gravel pieces.  We saw someone stopped cuz they had a flat tire.
 We arrived at the famous town of Chicken.  The early settlers wanted to call it Ptarmigan but didn't know how to spell it.


 At the Visitors Center in Tok we heard about a Dog Musher giving a talk so hurried over.
 Hugh Neff was the speaker.  Excellent presentation.  Walter is his best dog.  Hugh's from Chicago.
Then we went to the free concert at Fast Eddy's.  

What a HUGE day,:  Museum, traveling the Top of the World, then 2 entertainment venues.  

We dry camped for free at the gas station in Tok.

No comments:

Post a Comment