Dawson City River Hostel

... a wonderful scenic trip. It certainly would have been difficult to have made the trip on foot at the beginning of the gold rush. We are learning a lot about the goldrush as we follow the same path. We went into Canada on the train so had to go through customs. The train carriages had wood burning heaters so were very warm. We stopped for lunch at Bennett at 10.30am – a bit early but they seem to eat early over here. There is now nothing else there except the restaurant where ...

... we covered today was at less than 50 mph, and the scenery was not that great, either.

We stopped for, you guessed it, World Famous Cinnamon Buns at Braeburn Lodge. These buns are touted as large enough to feed four people. I am proud to say that I merely snapped a picture of them instead of purchasing one to gobble down.

After arriving in Dawson City, Art and I drove into town. Today was ...

... Yukon River Valley. In spite of the highway conditions described above, we managed to cover the 340 miles by 3:30 in the afternoon.

After arriving at our RV park, we went into town to the visitor center. There is much to do here. Parks Canada has taken over and restored numerous historic sites. Several of these have interpretive programs.

After dinner "at home", we headed for the ...

... definitely a qualifier for "middle of nowhere," but beautiful. If we thought the road into Chicken was rough, the road after Chicken was REALLY rough, narrow, and winding. The Milepost warns to watch for pilot vehicles leading tour busses from Eagle (even more remote than Chicken). The road climbs above the South Fork Fortymile River and affords some spectacular views. At Jack Wade Junction the Taylor Highway ...

... up the hill. As I approached him he slowly walked to the side of the road, and then after I passed he came back on the road and followed me as I went very slowly. Between fumbling for my camera and trying to change gears and use the clutch and brake he got to be pretty close, so I got out of there. The reason for going up the dome was to visit a Cache I placed there a few years ago. For those into geocaching, the purpose is to find a hidden package of information ...

... this is the Yukon ! So this evening I am painting the trim around all the windows while Sara and Nathan are out volunteering at the Miners' BBQ. This is an annual event when the miners who have been out in the field working long hours since the beginning of the summer get a chance to blow off some steam, while supporting a local charity. Then they go back out to work for the balance of the season. Distance Travelled: 0 Km

... weird, crazy or just plain stupid, but the challenge of the Top of the World Road through from Alaska to the Yukon and arrive in Dawson city was just too much of a lure for us to not take on this challenge. Hey don't forget the Castle has travelled the streets of LA and San Francisco, so the Castle can go anywhere man! NOW we can say we DID it cause it was there! Well the road was all of the reputations we had heard except the gravel was not sharp and ...

June 26/08 Well chalk one up for us old folks. We hiked to the top on Midnight Dome 1.5h UP!, for the Solstice. And then down. The old quads were screaming two days later. The sun goes down below the horizon for approx 1.5hrs at 12:30 AM. We hiked up with two Swiss folks we met here in Dawson. Barbara and Daniel have chucked it all and are traveling the world. We think we've made a big step to move to the YT, but these two sold everything and are ...