Spring Summer Yukon style
Trip Start
May 24, 2008
1
11
12
Trip End
Jun 2009
Whitehorse,
Yukon,
Canada
Monday, June 29, 2009
June 28
The quote above just about sums up the why of our year + long travels.
May had us skiing one day and paddling the next with the odd hike thrown in.
Friends from Canmore, Mike Coppang and Burke Duncan flew up for a couple of days for backcountry skiing in May. Cheryl and I skied with them one day down towards Skagway Summit. We skied up Feather Peak on one of those perfect spring days where we could have been wearing shorts
The Ascent!
.We skied and hiked up for 4.5h to the summit and then sat on top for an hour. We skied back down to the truck in 45 minutes on perfect corn snow!
Cheryl’s sister, Barb and Mom, Donna arrived mid May for a visit. It was really great to be able to show them around the Yukon and have them experience some of things we have for the last year.
We toured the museums and went shopping. We went down to Skagway and then took the ferry across to Haines returning via Haines Junction. This trip has become one of our favourite routes as it takes us through two beautiful mountain passes and gets us down to the sea all in a couple of days.
Barb and I took the White Pass Yukon train from Fraser B.C. down to Skagway. This was on the May long weekend and there is a Yukoner’s special with discounted fares. The rail line had only been opened for a couple of weeks after being closed for the winter. The snow banks were so huge that they had to cut through them and were right up to the edge of the tracks.
Two days after Donna and Barb left, Kevin and Myra arrived
Cheryl enjoying the sun
. They actually drove all the way from Winnipeg. We had a great visit with them. We had never really had the opportunity to spend a large block of time with them before so this was a special treat for all of us. We went camping out to Kusawa Lake for a couple of nights eating smores and cherry pies, canoeing and sitting around the fire. We let them do their own version of Yukon’s museums. We took the Washout Special train from Carcross to Bennett with them. The White Pass Yukon Railway ran this special trip because of a washout on the rail line. The normal trains run straight through from Carcross, Bennett, to Skagway. We had a couple of hours to hangout at the terminus of the Chilkoot Trail, before returning to Carcross. The train line is right along side historic Lake Bennett so the views were spectacular. They took off from here, taking the ferry to Port Hardy on Vancouver Island. They hung out down in the lower mainland for a bit and then did a marathon drive back to Winnipeg. I think they might be back in the Yukon at sometime as they only just barely got their feet wet up here.
In keeping with our being active, Cheryl and I entered the Kluane Chilkat International Bike Relay. It is a 240km bike relay from Haines Junction YT to Haines AK on June 20. We actually got a fair bit of riding in before the race
Mike, Hugh and Cheryl
. We only have our mtn bikes up here so we trained on them using slick tires. We ended up teamed up with another couple who live close by. We were able to use their road bikes for the actual race. We each did two legs and it took us 10 hours to complete the race, We were in the middle of the pack for the mixed 4 man teams but we figure due to our age if they handicapped us we’d be in the top three…..in our dreams!The race itself attracts, full on racers to folks riding bikes wearing costumes and taking 14h to do the race.
Cheryl actually rode hurt as she had come off her mtn bike on a training run the week before banging up her shoulder, hand and ribs. Being the trouper she is, she rode really well. She rode legs 5 and 6 which are up in the Alpine and have great views although I doubt if she got to appreciate them during the ride. She also finished her leg doing a downhill of 2000’. She says she was glad that there was a headwind so she didn’t go too fast! I rode the last two legs which are along the Chilkat River. There always seems to be wind coming off the ocean and this day was no exception. I hadn’t ridden a road bike seriously for 40 yrs so it was fun to get into a train of other riders and get a bit of a draft.
The relay ends in the Parade Grounds in Haines
Skagway and the ocean are not far away
. It was a great party with a thousand people camped in a field roughly the size of two football fields.Right after the relay we hung out in Haines with some friends and hiked out along the ocean for a day and stayed at the Chilkat State Park right on the ocean’s edge. The wild iris’s were in bloom along with all sorts of other flowers we don’t get to see inland.
We got home to Whitehorse in time to help out at the Yukon River Quest. This year we worked the start and up at Carmacks. We did equipment/safety checks and carried boats to the water on race day. There were 77 boats in the race. 8 Voyageur canoes along with 3 C1s and the rest being single and double kayaks and C2s.
This was the 11th year for the race and it attracts racers from all over the world. They came from: Slovenia, Dubai, Australia, Britain, and U.S.
The start is a Le Mans style, (Racers have to run from the start line to their boats). At 12:00 noon Wed. the racers took off down to the Yukon River. It was really exciting to watch all the racers tear down to the river and get into their boats.
We then drove up to Carmacks, 200 km north to get ready at the next check point. The check point is at Coal Mine Campground, which is right on the river
Summit of Feather Peak
. The racers have a mandatory seven hour layover here. They used to run the race straight through without layovers but they found racers went so far into deprivation they were no longer safe.
The first boats arrived around 6 AM Thurs AM, having paddled 18h straight. They pulled up on shore and their race support crews got them fed and into tents. The racers continued to arrive until 9 pm. The arrival cut off time was 11pm on Thursday. We stayed up until 4:00 Am Fri getting racers back on the water. After it was all over we had been up for 26 hours with only a few hours of quick snoozes. We chose not to follow the race up to Dawson for the finish as we had done that last year. For all this we got a T shirt! I’d do it again!
We are now thinking about heading home. We have to start packing and paring down our food supply. We’re not sure how we will get all the stuff we accumulated over the past year home….. :)
Comments
wow
your pictures look amazing, I am slightly envious of you both. safe travels home, penney
Re: wow
Thanks Penny. Only about 10 days before we start back. Hard to believe it's been nearly 14 months.
Cheryl