Fort Simpson to Dawson City

Many years ago we were caught by 'The Spell of the Yukon'. It wasn't gold that drew us as in Robert Service's poem of the same name, but, the amazing history of that gold rush of 1898 and how it opened up Canada's North.

From Robert Service's poem, the Spell of the Yukon, as seen on the side of a building in Dawson City.

Back then, we traveled to Yukon by government ferry, sleeping on deck, up the Inside Passage to Skagway and then hiked the thirty-three miles from Dyea to Lake Bennett with tent and sleeping bags on our back.

Yes, we climbed over the summit as shown in this famous photo. It wasn't as thickly snow-covered when we did it, but, that probably made it harder because we had to climb over slippery, car-sized boulders and steep scree to get to the top. At least we only had to do it once. The fortune hunters had to do it many times to carry their supplies over the top.

It was so long ago that you didn't need to have a reservation and a permit like you do now. There was no road through the White Pass then either. We picked up the narrow gauge railway at Lake Bennett and rode it into Whitehorse. Due to work commitments we had to fly out from there. It always felt like unfinished business that we didn't get to do the entire trip to Dawson City. In the interim period, the dream was kept alive with our very own dog sled and Alaskan Malamutes named 'Klondike' and 'Grey Cloud'. Now, finally, we were determined to finish the entire Trail of '98 and see Dawson city for ourselves.

This time we were doing the trip in comparative luxury with our camper van. We chose to drive the less-traveled roads, one of which was the Robert Campbell Highway from Watson lake to Carmacks. There was so little traffic that we only saw one other car in two and a half hours of driving! It was single lane in places and mostly gravel and mud. We thought we'd see lots of wildlife, but, were disappointed, our vehicle was probably making too much noise.

Driving into Dawson City, we were immediately taken with the ambience. The whole town is a National Historic Site and strict regulations have kept the buildings in the style of the period.

Some of the buildings are still in their original condition, these two are badly tilted due to permafrost issues.

And some of the buildings are beautifully restored, this is the Palace Grand Theatre.

This is the building that has the 'Spell of the Yukon' painted on the outside wall.

Although most attractions were closed 'two weeks ago' and a lot of the town was actually boarded up for the winter, we still enjoyed walking around and visiting sites both in and out of town.

We drove out to the site of the original gold claim on Bonanza Creek and to see this Dredge, what an incredible machine, wooden-hulled, it basically moved itself along on a self-dug pond, digging up gravel at the front, running it through a sluice box inside to extract the gold and spitting out gravel in huge worm-like castings out the back. The landscape has basically been destroyed with these huge casting trails still intact.

We drove up to the Midnight Dome overlooking the town and the Yukon River. Note the snow cover and the beautiful mountain view in the background.

View of Dawson City and the Yukon River from the Midnight Dome which overlooks the town.

It was great to see Pierre Berton's childhood home where he lived until the age of twelve. Unfortunately, it's not open to the public. It was interesting to find out that Berton had a dog, also named 'Grey Cloud', just like ours.

A riverboat being restored.

Yukon River ferry crossing.