Dawson City, Yukon

1) moi atop “The Dome” overlooking Dawson City and the Klondike River, where it all began

Last year, in 2013, miners in and around Dawson City, Yukon brought up some 48,276 fine ounces of placer gold worth an estimated CAD$72,414,000. Is it any wonder that some 129 years after first discovering gold in Rabbit – now called Bonanza – Creek in 1885 gold rush stampeders are still here. In its heyday, in 1900, miners discovered a staggering 1,077,550 ounces of placer gold and since 1885 it’s estimated that some CAD$1,606,215,000 worth of gold has been found. That $1.6 billion dollars though has not remained in Dawson City and the city today of some 2,000 (in summer) souls is little but a memory, a shadow of what was at the turn of the last century (circa 1900) a city of 30,000 people – in fact, the largest city north of Seattle and west of Winnipeg.

Dawson’s history is undeniable for sure and is wrought with all manner of characters, hucksters and dreamers. When Skookum Jim Mason and George Carmack discovered gold on August 16, 1896, Dawson was nothing more than a moose pasture and fishing camp used by the Tr’ondek Hwech’in aboriginal community. When news finally reached south a year later in July 1897 – thanks to a spectacular article in the Seattle Post-Intelligence newspaper – it set off the Klondike gold rush. It’s said that some 1 million people laid plans to head north, a hundred thousand actually set off, and roughly 30,000 managed to arrive on site. By then most of the claims had already been staked. The quaint vision we hold of rough and ready, independent, grizzled miners hand-mining riverbeds actually only lasted a mere 3 years. By 1899, the rich ground was exhausted and claims were consolidated into concessions which the federal government then gifted into the hands of large mining companies who employed steam shovels and those behemoths of the Klondike known as dredges to do the dirty work.

The drive from Whitehorse to Dawson will take 6 hours on Highway No. 2 (the North Klondike Highway) through the wee hamlets of Carmacks, Pelly Crossing and Stewart Crossing.

2) Fox Lake on route north

3) the Five Finger Rapids, just north of Carmacks

4) papa and G enjoy the view looking down onto Pelly Crossing

5) stopping on route … 6 hours is a long drive

6) the Tintina Trench, a massive geological scar that crosses the Yukon can be best viewed just outside Dawson

7) Dawson City taken from atop “The Dome”

8) an Air North 737 heads into land at Dawson

Dredges were particularly nasty machines when it came to the environment and operated in the Klondike area from September 1898 through till 1960. Dredges operated 24 hours a day, 200 days each year and essentially created their own ponds to float in, spewing out rock trails behind them. The tailing trails can be seen as you drive into Dawson and from atop The Dome. About 13 kilometers outside of Dawson, down a very poor road, you can visit Dredge No. 4, now a Canadian National Historic Site. Well worth seeing one of the giants in person.

9) here you can see the trailings

10) the mammoth Dregde No 4

11) and again

In Dawson on our way up to Inuvik we stayed at the Westmark Inn. Filled with many cruisetour clients (on route either south to Whitehorse and Skagway or west toward Anchorage); it provided decent accommodations for a couple nights and a good restaurant that served a simply delicious bison ragu. We commented that Dawson is sort of surreal. It is a National Historic Site and as such, remains a snapshot of what it was in 1900 complete with dirt roads, board walks and quaint, if ramshackly buildings. There is not-a-one commercially branded anything within the city – no McDonalds, no Starbucks, no Tim Hortons, no Wal-mart (which is sort of nice). The locals seem to be suspended in time, and, of a fashion, take on characters from the Klondike days time such that you feel as though you are in a theme park albeit minus the rides. I remain unsure whether I think that is good or bad. On the whole I enjoyed Dawson. Two days is plenty of time and I’m glad I made a point of visiting.

12) here’s the Westmark

Dawson has a rather unique/strange/sick (take your pick) activity which was recently in the news. This event is held at the Downtown Hotel every night at 9:00PM under the dutiful watch of The Captain and involves a preserved human toe. You read that right, a preserved human toe. It’s real, I’ve seen it. To become a member of the Sourtoe Cocktail club you must order a drink of your choosing and then consume it … with the preserved human toe in your glass. To be a full member that toe must touch your lips when drinking said drink and The Captain is there to ensure this is adhered to. Seems the Downtown Hotel had, up till just recently, two toes. There was a fine of CAD$500 should you accidentally swallow the toe. Last year, that is – believe it or not – exactly what happened. A patron took up the challenge, dropped $500 on the table and promptly swallowed the toe. Yuck! One toe now remains but apparently the hotel receives many offers of donated toes. Yuck! The fine has since been increased to CAD$2,000 FYI. Whether or not we are now official members of the club shall remain secret as, much like Las Vegas, what happens in Dawson stays in Dawson.

13) papa saunters across to the Downtown Hotel

14) home of this odd club

15) the bar is rather dated

16) here is the trophy? to honour a past Captain of the Sourtoe Club

17) Papa exits the Downtown Hotel … is he now a member?….

18) the Masonic Temple in Dawson

19) the Commissioner’s Residence (home from 1900 to 1916 of the Commissioner of the Yukon)

20) the Palace Grand Theatre (built by Arizona Charlie Meadows in 1899)

21) Dawson has many cute little homes like these

22) the Red Feather Saloon

23) the 3rd Avenue complex built in 1901 demonstrates what happens when you build heated buildings on frozen ground

24) the childhood home of Canada’s historical literary giant, Pierre Burton

25) the cabin that novelist Jack London lived in while in the Klondike

26) the Dawson City Museum which was originally the Territorial Administration Building and served as the Yukon’s capital and legislature until it was moved to Whitehorse in 1953

27) moi acting as the Premier in the legislature

28) pretty

30) G goes exploring … Cheechakos makes great baked goods by the way!

31) the SS Keno sternwheeler can be found in Dawson; this picture illustrates just how shallow a draft these ships took

32) the old St Andrew’s Church

33) the newer version of that same church

34) the inside of the church

35) who dat?

36) the quaint homes along the street across from the hotel

During the Klondike times, Dawson was famous for gold, of course, and great law and order thanks to the Northwest Mounted Police (the precursor to our Mounties). However, pull 30,000 mostly young men together and vices to take root designed primarily to separate not the boys from the men, but rather the boys and men from their dollars: prostitution, drinking and gambling. Presumably all three still co-exist there, but in particular gambling and drinking have deep roots as evidenced by “Diamond Tooth Gurties“, a rollicking den of gambling and drinking which we did find ourselves in on a couple of occasions.

37) papa and I try some of Yukon Brewery’s excellent summer beers before heading across to Diamond Tooth Gerties

38) the boys head out

39) we’ve arrived

40) the girls are a’ dancing in the gambling den (you’d almost think you’re in Paris save the legions of white-haired cruisetour patrons!)

41) Papa watches the show

42) and seems to be enjoying it

43) you’ll note a couple of things in this picture: a) I’m drinking a beer earned from my winnings at the roulette table at Diamond Tooth Gerties; b) I’m wearing shorts meaning it is still very warm in Dawson;