Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, is a modern little city of 25,000 people on the banks of the Yukon River. We are in a place called Caribou Campground, on the outskirts, and I am inside a log hut in the campground, lighting a fire and stepping back 155 years.
The hut, built of spruce logs and chinked in the gaps with moss, is offered up by the owners of the campground to help you experience the lifestyle of the early settlers. It is 12 feet wide by 8 feet deep. There are a couple of windows in one corner, and a collection of early stores on the shelves. The firewood is there to encourage you to build your own fire. I get it crackling and the cabin begins to warm up. I sit there, thinking about those early settlers. There's a typed story on the wall that tells about Joe, the pioneer who came up from Seattle back in 1857. He was a loner. But he had a dog named George.
“Joe traveled all by himself. He carried a rifle, a couple of traps, a good knife, some tinned meat and coffee. He'd heard of the countless prospectors up in Dawson City, north of here, the hard job they did and their inability to deal with sudden wealth. He'd heard the only people getting rich in Dawson City were the owners of saloons, the guys selling eggs (one single egg at that time cost $4.00), the prostitutes and the gangsters. No. This was not what Joe was looking for. He wanted to head north to the Yukon to find solitude.
“Joe was a mountain man and not a very outgoing person. The only company he deeply enjoyed was his dog, a mutt. They say his name was George. Joe loved to discuss all sorts of things with his pal, who was a very good listener.
“It took him a long time until he found his place to stay, where he could live peacefully, without being bothered with too many human beings. He lived off the land; he hunted, fished and he collected 'fruits of the north'.”
The crackling fire lulled me and held me in that web of memories. My book fell out of my hands as I sat there by the fire and I dreamed of those early pioneers who defined courage and a willingness to step off the edge of our known world.
We drove into downtown Whitehorse for dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. Then it was time to do some grocery shopping and then a quick trip back up the road to the campground.
Next day, we wandered through Whitehorse again. This is an interesting enough place, though its interest seems to be less so today than 100 years ago. The stern-wheeler, SS Yukon, sits of the hard along the Yukon River. She'll never move again. When you listen to Canadian Radio, much of the talk is about characters from the past. Today, the town is like so many other places – just getting along. There are lots of aboriginals on the streets. All the others seems to be trying to get tourists to part with their dollars.
Friday, June 18
We rolled north and west on a drizzly day. The mountains to our south are shrouded in clouds. The elk look at us cheekily from the side of the road. One female stuck out her tongue when I stopped the rig to get her picture.
We came to Kluane Lake, halfway between Whitehorse and the Alaskan border, and decided to call it quits for the day. We pulled into a Yukon Territorial campground and found the best site was just being vacated. We took up residency, paid our $12 and watched the view steadily improve as the afternoon sun cracked through. Jo and I went for a hike along the lake and learned we are in a rain shadow area. Only 210mm falls at our campground. Up in the mountains to our west, however, 2,200mm falls each year.
The mosquitoes seem to like this rainless area and they were so thick we felt we could be lifted on their wings. We have invested in a new clip-on device with a fan that throws out a mosquito repellent. IT WORKS! The five million mosquitoes circled around us but none ever landed. Now there's an endorsement.
This area, we were told by the interpretative signs, did not have ice covering it during the ice age back 12,000 years ago. The Elias Mountains, to our west, are a totally different story. They never lose their ice. This is the beginning of the Bering Sea land bridge which allowed our ancestors to make their way across from China, originally Africa.
The Tlingit people who live here now have trails through these mountains. In addition, they have much to teach us about the wild plants that are useful sources of vitamins and nutrition.
We watched as the crystal-clear lake became still and reflected the peaks to our south. What a glorious place this is. We reveled in the beauty and peacefulness. We took another walk, with the sun still riding on our shoulder at 10:30 at night. The still water provided a perfect reflection of the mountains and I was able to get pictures that'll stay with me for the rest of my life.
We did note a sign on our way into the campground that warned tent campers not to camp in July and August because bears will be here in numbers then. They apparently like the soapberries that will be ready during that time.
Saturday, June 19
We came back to the US after a horrendous ride over a heaving highway that shook us and the springs on our rig. The permafrost offers up massive resistance to man's efforts to lay a road over it. For the first time in weeks, we faced a real duel with the highway. We came up on our first rock-n-roll piece of road when we came down a hill. There were warning flags on the side, but we were unprepared for the severity.
The up-and-down motion was like a roller-coaster. We desperately fought to bring the speed of our RV down to 20 miles an hour while we rocked back and forth. Then we found we could maintain 20-25 miles an hour with occasional bursts of speed to 40 when we could see the road ahead. We learned how to navigate by watching the solid yellow line in the center of the highway. As you looked on down the road, it became clear that trouble waited ahead when the yellow line began to buckle and twist. Not a lot of fun.
When we stopped at a rest area, we met a couple in a rental car who had flown from Denmark to Calgary, Alberta. They were driving to Fairbanks and back to Calgary. They shared our wonder at the staggering mountains that stand above us. “We have nothing higher than 500 feet in Denmark,” the Dane said with a laugh.
When we arrived at the US border, a young border agent welcomed us with a smile and asked how we were doing. “Well, pretty much surviving,” I told him and he laughed. “We have the road built this way to keep out the riff-raff,” he said with a laugh.
As soon as we cleared the border, we decided to call it a day and we pulled into an atrocious park that did offer electricity and water, along with rutted pull-through areas and dripping faucets.. We washed down the rig and the car and then tried to realign our spines, hoping that tomorrow will be a better day.
We now have driven 6,150 miles since Florida.
No comments:
Post a Comment