Dawson City--June 29

It wasn't raining this morning. Bob went out and filled our water tank and emptied our dirty tanks while I was getting yesterdays blog done and dressing and eating a quick bite. At 9am we had our briefing for tomorrow's drive to Chicken, Alaska over the Top of the World Highway. You remember it wasn't raining before very long as we were sitting outside taking notes it started to sprinkle but not hard. After our briefing the owner of the park gave us more info about Dawson City--some we had heard and some we had not.



Bob and I took off to do some sightseeing in town. We drove down to the river where there is a dike all along the river beside the town and out in the middle of the river is a small cabin floating at anchor. The Yukon and the Klondike join and the water is muddy down one half and clean down the other and they also flow at different speeds-quite interesting. We followed the river and saw a small riverboat that takes tours and also saw where the ferry works just below. We then went driving around and I did some walking taking pictures of old buildings in town and went into some stores. At 1:30 we all took a guided walking tour and that was very informative. For instance, during the gold rush when people died the cabinet maker decided he could make more money making caskets so he became the mortician. When the ground froze you couldn't bury them so they got stacked up in the back room until he finally got the bright idea to dig the graves in the spring and summer and have them ready. Due to the circumstances up here the people learn to make due and to figure out another solution to their need.


About 1900 people live in Dawson year round now. They build their buildings above the ground due to the perma frost and then insulate them well because they don't want the heat to heat the perma frost or it will get soft and the building will tilt and even at that they have to jack up parts of their buildings from time to time. We went to the Jack London Museum and saw half of his cabin. It was discovered some years back by some Americans. They know it was his because of where it was located and he had cut his name into a log piece near the roof and had the date and signed it miner/author and this was just before he started to write a lot.

After the tour we spent more time in town going into shops,etc. until it was 5pm so we could go back to eat supper at The Drunken Goat again--it was so good the first time we did a repeat. Then we drove to find the Robert Service Cabin for later. Robert Service was English who lived in Scotland and eventually got to Canada and lived in a cabin in Dawson where he lived when he first had his poems published. He is famous for the poem "The Cremation of Sam McGee" and many others. We went for a presentation of his works and a history given by a young man in period dress. All the people who work for the Canada Parks Service in town dress in period clothing. It was an hour and it was very good. The cabin he lived in while here in Dawson for 4 years is well preserved.

For all the rain and mucky dirt roads that we had yesterday--today got hot and the roads are getting dusty. Only the front road which is the highway is paved and all the others are dirt. Downtown you walk on boardwalks just as they did then. This has been an interesting stay.