The south end of the beach at Hua Hin, Thailand.
Where are Kevin and Ruth now? Hua Hin, Thailand.

Where are Kevin and Ruth going next? Maldives on March 23rd.

Wednesday, June 13, 2018

A beautiful day in and around Whitehorse, Yukon!

We were sitting having breakfast yesterday morning where we had overnighted at the Yukon College beside the Yukon Arts Centre. There was not a cloud in the sky, and we were thinking of heading down to Miles Canyon to do some hiking. Ruth was reading some of the local guide literature we had picked up at the Whitehorse Visitors Centre, when she said "hey, there's a hiking trail right here"!

So right after breakfast we went for a 2 km (1.3 mile) hike through the forest.

The trail wasn't marked very well, although the path itself was well worn. Problem was, many other paths intertwined with the one we wanted to follow!

A beautiful day in Whitehorse!

Isn't that the neatest beaver dam ever?

The trail ended by the Yukon Arts Centre, with a beautiful view of the city...

View of Whitehorse, Yukon.

Not the greatest hike but it was a good half hour warm up for our Miles Canyon hike after lunch!

Then we went and found the Whitehorse Recycling Centre to get rid of our empty beer bottles and wine box. They have a similar system here in the Yukon as they do in Saskatchewan. To keep all beverage containers out of the ditches they have a refundable deposit on them... including milk containers. Great system.

Then, we drove over to Miles Canyon. It's a really scenic area, and a very popular spot. There's not a huge parking area and on a gorgeous day like it was yesterday, it was understandably busy. But, we managed to get Sherman parked out of the way and we sat and had an early lunch before taking off on a hike. By the time we set off, it had quieted down a fair bit.

View of the Yukon River from the parking area.

There's a fairly new suspension bridge crossing the canyon.

Looking north from the bridge.

And south from the bridge.

Once you cross the bridge from the parking area, there are a lot of different hiking trails on the east side. Like I said yesterday you could hike for a month all around Whitehorse and never be on the same trail twice!

We love this type of scenery.

Me on the trail!

Ruth.

Just after I took that shot, these two girls came paddling down the river. The water is moving right along, and to be honest you don't need to be doing a lot of paddling if you're heading north!

Great scenery.

You can actually book self guided canoe trips on the Yukon River that go all the way from Whitehorse to Dawson City, a distance of 736 kms (460 miles) on the water. It's actually a 16 day trip!

And, the Yukon River is a Class 1 river and anybody with basic canoe skills can do the trip.

I thought it was a great idea, until Ruth said "What about the bugs?"

Well so far, the bugs haven't been an issue. We haven't seen any mosquitoes to speak of since we left Grande Prairie. 

Anyhow, I think that would be a fantastic future trip.

More scenery.


We finished up the hike and we had done 4.7 kms (2.9 miles). 

We had an appointment with Yukon Tourism at 3:00pm to go over some of the things we want to do on our route over the next two months or so. 

We got there a little early, so we went for another short stroll around the area.

The Log Skyscraper.

There are two of these types of buildings, one is only a two story. These two buildings are actually on Canada's National Historic Buildings list because they are the only two in existence in the country. They were built in 1947 as private rental accommodation, and are still used as such today.

The Yukon Tourism Building.

They have lots of parking for RVs.

And, they're open from 8:00am to 8:00pm every single day for the summer. They have tons of information, as well as internet access and telephones for your use. They're one of the best tourist info places we've ever been in.

We sat with two of their reps and went over some of the stuff we want to do. It gave us a much clearer picture of what's ahead on our route, and how much time we need to do the things we want to spread out over the time we have here.

And that means that we may not make it to the Arctic Circle for Summer Solstice, but also that it's not that important. Once we make it north of the Arctic Circle, even if we're a few days late it's going to be 24 hour daylight anyhow at this time of year. 

Our route over the next two months.

We've learned how much there is to see in and around Whitehorse, and we're not done here yet. And it turns out there's just as much in Dawson City, although we'll be there twice. Once before heading up to "Tuk" as Tuktoyaktuk is called, and once again on the way back down.

And, we want to stop and do some hiking at Tombstone Territorial Park on the way up the Dempster Highway towards Inuvik.

Very helpful people at the Yukon Tourist Centre, and we are now looking forward to the next two months even more!

When we were done, we headed back outside to enjoy more of the beautiful day...

Yikes... these kids were swimming!

Sure, the sun was warm... but it was still only about 18C (64F) out... and the water was like ice. Kids don't seem to mind these things!

Scenery along the way.

We had visited the SS Klondike sternwheeler riverboat yesterday, but we got called away to have Sherman's repairs done before we got a chance to see the interior. So we returned there to finish our tour...

They have the interior all done up like it's in the middle of a journey up the Yukon River.

Good thing they remembered the important stuff!

Ruth, on the "sun deck".

The galley.

You can see the dining area through the galley photo above. Unfortunately, the old boat has some structural issues and the dining room is closed to visitors.

The engine room!

Whitehorse has a lot of murals, and the Visitors Centre will give you a list of them so that you can do a mural walking tour around town. We went and looked at some of them, but this one in the Yukon Government Building was the best...

It's a series of 24 "stained glass" style panels. Really neat stuff.

Downtown Whitehorse.

Downtow Whitehorse.

The Kwanlin Dun Cultural Centre.

The Kwanlin Dun Cultural Centre is free. It's done by the local First Nations group and a worthwhile stop just to say hi. Friendly people. They had an interesting display about trapping in the Yukon and how some continue to make a living that way. Rough work living out in the bush like that, but the people who do it, love it.

One of the ladies taught us how to say "thank you" in the local language... gunalchish.

We drove back to Jean and Art's place and parked up in their driveway again. 

We've got more to see around Whitehorse today, and then we'll get back on the road and head out of town north tomorrow.

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Record low price on this pancake compressor...


And in Canada, a great deal on an Acer laptop...




24 comments:

  1. They brought the "good stuff" so they always had safe water to drink! :-)

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  2. I went and looked at the map of the highway up to Tuktoyak yesterday. I was impressed that Google Streetview was available all the way up to Inuvik. It looks like maybe the road wasn't finished past there when they went? Looks like it will be an amazing trip!

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    Replies
    1. The road from Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk was only completed in November 2017.

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  3. Very beautiful area. That river trip would be great but I could never do 16 days, 4 or 6 maybe

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    Replies
    1. Yep, we tend to agree. They do shorter excursions as well.

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  4. I see a bottle of A-1 Steak Sauce on the shelf in the kitchen of the boat; did they really use A-1 on their meat back then? No doubt, they had plenty of prime meat on the table; just a short hunting trip when the boat was moored.

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    Replies
    1. A.1. Steak Sauce was created sometime before 1831 by Henderson William Brand, who was a cook for King George IV.

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    2. I have no idea whether they hunted any time the boat was moored but they did have a little screened in room on the top level that showed legs of cured ham hanging in it so they at least had some cured meat to eat.

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  5. It's nice that you are taking the time required to properly take in the town. Awesome pictures as usual.

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    Replies
    1. There is actually quite a lot to see and do in Whitehorse and even we won't see it all. It's unfortunate that many people only allow themselves one day in Whitehorse before continuing on up to Alaska, they miss so much.

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  6. My favourite is the two gals in the canoe!

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    Replies
    1. Yes, we like that one too! We shouted down to them when they went through to checkout our blog because Kevin was going to post the picture on it, not sure if they will remember the name of the blog though.

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  7. waiting for a pic of the Kevin quick dip ......

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You will be waiting a very long time because Kevin doesn't do cold water! ;-)

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  8. We might catch up to you on your second time around in Whitehorse. Left Montreal Friday, we are in Fargo ND...1661 Miles so far. We will be following your trails on the Top of the World to TOK but we are going to Fairbanks.... and the rest after. Can't wait to get to Moose Jaw and start being a tourist again and stop driving 400-600 km a day.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yep, it is a long way to travel when you start off in Montreal. Not sure what your timeline is going to be, we figure we won't be back in Whitehorse until the end of July or sometime the first week of August but that can always change because some of the roads that we will be driving on are weather dependent.

      Keep us up to date on your progress and hopefully our paths will cross somewhere along our routes. Have fun and enjoy the ride. :-)

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  9. Thank you for posting more pics of Whitehorse which we didn’t see when we were there in July 2013. We did the short hike on the Mikes Csnyon and visited the Klondike vessel and cultural museum. Didn’t have time to visit the tourist centre. Will do that next time. We attempted the Drmoster Hwy back then but turned around after 5 min on the extremely rough road. Hopefully you’ll get all the way to Tuk on the new highway. We continued to do that circle route on your map and ended up in Valdez, AK. LOOKIN forward to your blog towards the Arctic Circle! Safe travels.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I guess now you will have more to see on your next visit north. Whitehorse has a lot to offer and a stop at the Visitor Centre is a must. There are lots of hikes in the whole area surrounding Whitehorse that I am sure you would enjoy.

      We know that the Dempster Highway is going to be slow going, we will just have to be patience and take our time.

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  10. You realize we are all going to be disappointed if you don't end up with some really gruesome mosquito stories after this trip. Even if you have to make them up out of whole cloth...

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    Replies
    1. We have no doubt that before this trip is over we will definitely have a story or two to tell about the mosquitoes, at the moment we are just happy to not have to deal with them. :-)

      Delete

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