Dawson City Day Two

We awakened to a most beautiful day. Clear blue skies, 65 degrees, mild breeze. How could it be any better. I was feeling pretty good about our adventure. After all we have covered almost 3,000 miles on two lane highways. So, this morning I had a conversation with one of our neighbors who told me that they shipped their vehicles to South America in 2005, drove as far south as they could and then headed north arriving in North America via the Pan American Highway. 44,000 miles later they are here in Dawson City. They left for Inuvik at the end of the Dempster highway today. This is a single retired English lady traveling with another couple in a caravan of two.

English Traveler

Having been put in our place, we left to explore the Dawson City area. Our first stop was a visit to the Visitor Center. We got a lot of good suggestions on what to see and left on our little voyage of discovery.

Downtown Dawson City

Following the directions of the Visitor Center lady we found the old cemeteries of Dawson City.

R.C.M.P Cemetery

While I find old cemeteries very interesting I was most delighted by the wild flowers in the area. This time I was able to capture some good images.

Bluebells

Wild Rose

Next on our agenda was a visit up Bonanza Creek Road to check out the old time mining activity in the area. A high light of this adventure was a tour of Dredge #4. This huge dredge was built in the early 1900s to place mine for gold. A dredge literally floats in its own pond while digging dirt in front of it, bringing it into the dredge, separating the heavier gold from the rest of the dirt, sluicing the gold and discarding the rest of the dirt out the back end of the dredge. An amazing process and an amazing piece of equipment.

Dredge #4

After the tour we pointed the jeep up a gravel back road leading to a place called King Solomon Dome. We made an elevation gain of 2,000 feet and were rewarded with great views of the area. What a place to have a picnic.

Great Picnic Site

After 40 miles of gravel road we were back on the Klondike Loop and headed back to Dawson City. We decided to check out the other side of the Yukon River which required a ferry crossing.

Yukon River Ferry

Once across we parked the car in the Yukon Campground and walked down river to look at the
stern wheeler graveyard. After they were no longer needed they just floated the old stern wheelers on shore in high water and left them there to rot.

Stern Wheeler Graveyard

Tomorrow we point the motorhome west for a journey along the Top of the World Highway. This will entail a ferry crossing with the whole rig and about 50 miles of gravel road. Should be fun.