After spending too much time in Fairbanks we were happy to hit the road again and head to our last major north country destinations before heading south: the Taylor Highway, Top of the World Highway, and Dawson City, Yukon.
There are only two routes into Alaska by road. You can drive the Alaska Highway from Whitehorse, Yukon, to the tiny town of Tok (pronounced “toke”) Alaska, or you can drive from Whitehorse up to Dawson City, Yukon, then take the gravel Top of the World Highway and Taylor Highway to Tok. On the way in we took the Alaska Highway route, so for the return trip we took the Top of the World Highway route.
The Taylor and Top of the World Highways have a bit of a fearsome reputation among RV travelers. The guidebook recommends against driving them in the rain because of slick conditions, recommends carrying a spare tire or two because of the harsh gravel, and says to be careful when making way for oncoming traffic because RVs have toppled over after pulling over too far onto soft shoulders. When we passed through Whitehorse in late June we heard horror stories about terrible conditions and lots of flat tires in a long construction zone and, sure enough, a story of a RV just recently toppling over and then sliding down a hill until it was stopped by trees. Needless to say these stories made Pa (but not Ma) a bit nervous! However, as the summer progressed and we talked to more people the consensus seemed to be that route was perfectly doable, so we decided to go for it.
As it turned out, the Taylor and Top of the World Highways were a piece of cake, and some of the most beautiful scenery we have seen. The first sixty miles or so were paved and had lots of vivid fall colors. We spent the night at the beautiful West Fork Campground on the Taylor. The next day was Ma’s birthday, and we celebrated by stopping in the community of Chicken, Alaska, a tiny collection of rustic tourist attractions in the middle of nowhere. After Chicken we hit the gravel portion of the Taylor, but it wasn’t bad it all; it was soon enough after a rain that the dust wasn’t bad, but not so soon that it was still muddy. Then we had thirteen miles of brand new pavement; the construction zone that had spawned so many horror stories back in June was now the nicest roadway in all of Alaska. After passing through a tiny customs station we drove another few hours on good gravel on the Canadian side. This part ran along the ridges of the mountains instead of down in the valleys (hence the name “Top of the World Highway”) and there were gorgeous vistas of fall colors on all sides. The highway ended at the Yukon River, where a small ferry takes travelers and their vehicles across to Dawson City and the Klondike Highway. The Yukon River is fairly wide at Dawson City, and apparently it is cheaper to run a ferry 24-7 for the summer months (in winter vehicles just drive across the ice) than it is to build a bridge.
Rather than immediately taking the ferry across we camped for a few days at the lovely Yukon River Campground, which is across the river from Dawson City and right next to the ferry landing. Our site is next to the river, and there is a large gravel bar right below our site for the kids to play on. A few minutes downstream is a sternwheeler graveyard where the hulks of at least five or six old paddlewheelers are lined up in the woods next to the river. To go into town we just walk up the to free ferry and take the next one; it runs back and forth continuously and the wait is never more than five minutes.
Dawson City was the center of the Klondike gold rush, and it still looks much like it did back in those days. Many, if not most, of the buildings in town are from that period and have been well preserved. The Canada Parks system has a nice visitor center, and there is an old sternwheeler parked along the main street. All in all, Dawson City is probably the most attractive tourist oriented town we have seen in the north country.
The gold mining in the Klondike was, and still is, placer mining, where miners dig up rock and dirt from current and ancient river beds and then run it through sluices to separate out the heavier gold nuggets. Over the past hundred and some years every single bit of land in the valleys around Dawson City has been dug up and processed, so for a few miles outside of town the landscape is nothing but big piles of discarded river rocks interspersed with ponds. What surprised me is that placer mining is still very active in the area. On one drive up the creek where gold was originally discovered we saw at least three active mining operations, which generally involves an excavator digging up gravel, and a big machine to process it to sift out the gold. Many businesses in town have a sign up that says “Placer mining supports this business, and this business supports placer mining.” We talked to a couple who are working for the season at a placer mine four hours from Dawson City on dirt roads. He is one of the operators for the excavator (they dig 24-7 in shifts) and she cooks for the camp. They said they processed 300 tons of gravel an hour, and that yielded about one ounce of gold.
While Dawson City is one of the nicest places we have stopped we are probably going to be leaving in a couple days. Fall comes on fast here, and the puddles and ponds are already starting to freeze at night, and the days just barely get up to the fifities, and the forecast is for some nights to get into the low 20s and upper teens in the next few days.