Virtual Alaska - Day 3: 09-25-99
Yukon River
Greetings again, from Alaska.
I'm writing this entry for Day 3, Saturday, on Monday.
This is the first opportunity I've had to get to a computer
since Friday's entry. I received your e-mail today; the
one Mrs. Blakeslee sent with some of your questions. She
commented about my delayed arrival to Skagway, so apparently,
with the exception of photographs, our connection is working
pretty well. We appear to be communicating.
Thanks to the 6 or 8 of you who have written e-mail messages
to me. I've replied to those of you who I can. A couple
of you appear to have sent e-mail from Willis Computers,
so I can't reply to you since you don't have your own e-mail
addresses yet.
GEOBEAR UPDATE...
I brought six GeoBears with me as you know. They were
H690 - Amanda Rhodes
H636 - Josh Thornton
H656 - Courtney Hughes
H591 - Kate Bowie
H536 - Carlos Escobedo
H576 - Rachel Searfoss
Two of them, Amanda's and Carlos' bears left Skagway on Friday
night on the Alaska Ferry heading south for Juneau and
other places. Amanda's went with Carol Demech. She's
heading first for Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Carol is an American. Carlos' bear went with Angela Jacob,
a young Australian woman who is from Hobart, Tasmania,
Australia. She's touring Alaska and Canada. She's heading,
with GeoBear, to Tacoma Washington.
The other four bears went with me on a drive to
the city of Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory of Canada,
on Saturday. Whitehorse is about 120 miles from Skagway.
The four bears and I drove from Alaska, into British
Columbia, then into the Yukon.
I brought the remaining four bears with me to school today,
and Josh Thornton's and Kate Bowie's have found traveling
companions. Josh's is going with Kristin Brown, a sophomore
student here at Skagway school, to her home in Kalispell,
Montana. Kristin's family works here in Skagway during
the summer, then returns to Montana in the winter. Kate's
bear is going with Rebecca Telles, also a sophomore student,
to Wrangell, Alaska for a Southeast Alaska Honors Choir
rehearsal for several days in October.
I still have Courtney's dog and Rachel's crab. I'll find
someone to take them soon.
IN RESPONSE TO YOUR QUESTIONS...
The temperature outside Mr. Pickett's classroom at this
moment, 1:00 p.m. Monday is 57 degrees F. That's about
as warm as it's been since I got here.
The average daily high temperature this time of year is
in the mid fifties.
Houses here in Skagway a built like homes in Delaware, but
Skagway homes, on average, are smaller than homes, on
average, in Delaware. Many of the homes here were built
shortly after the gold rush and continue to be used today.
The home I am staying in - the Skagway Home Hostel - was
built in 1901 or 1902, if I recall correctly, the later
years of the gold rush. The town of Skagway still looks
like an old western town in many ways. And now that the
cruise ships and other tourists aren't coming any more
it seems a bit like a ghost town. Hundreds of people come
here to work in the shops and hotels for the summer, then
go home for the winter. Most have already left. It's
strangely quiet here.
Students here seem very well behaved. Mr. Pickett says
they are pampered (spoiled) though. Remember, this school
has only a little over 100 students in grades k through 12.
So individual students get lots of attention.
Everyone speaks English here. Alaska is an American state,
just like Ohio.
Thanks for the "good luck" on getting pictures working.
I've already expended a lot of energy trying with no success,
so I think I'll give up and concentrate on my reports.
I'll have lots of pictures to show you when I return.
NOW, HERE'S MY JOURNAL ENTRY FOR SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 25...
I had planned to rent a car for the weekend to explore
the area, but my hosts suggested that I shouldn't rent from,
the only person in town renting cars this time of year.
Some other folks have not had good experience renting there.
So... my new friends lent me their car to drive to Whitehorse,
in the Yukon Territory of Canada.
I left Skagway at 8:30 a.m. on Saturday. I bought gas. It
cost $1.71 per gallon. That's a lot more than in Ohio where
it's about $1.25 these days at the most?
The Klondike Road to Whitehorse starts up the White Pass,
the same pass through the mountains that the stampeders
took on foot 101 years ago. Today, the White Pass and Yukon
Railroad also traverses the pass as far as the summit,
the highest elevation of the pass.
From the highway one can look down on the railroad below
and the foot trail that the hopeful goldseekers followed.
At one point even the entrance to the "Dead Horse Gulch"
is visible from the Klondike Highway. This is the part
of the trail where more than 3000 pack animals died at
the hands of stampeders pushing them mercilessly toward
the Klondike.
About nine or ten miles out of Skagway on the Klondike
Highway one comes to the U.S./Canada border.
Another ten miles or so, in Fraser, British Columbia, we
come to Canadian Customs. The customs officer, after
doing her official duties in checking me through, posed
for a picture with three of the GeoBears I had with me.
Sorry, Josh, yours got briefly lost track of, so he wasn't in
the picture. Susan was so excited about the bears that she
photocopied the tag of Rachel's crab and planned to give
the photocopy to a friend going to Holland later on.
Today's drive started out in the clouds. But, as we drove on,
the skies cleared opening breathtaking vistas around very
curve and bend in the road. The mouintains of the
Coastal Range and the interior are powdered with their
first snowfalls of the new winter. It's fall here at
lower evelevations, but winter has struck the mountain
tops.
All along the drive to Whitehorse the landscape was covered
with green conifers, including Sitka Spruce, and hemlock and golden
leaves of the quaking aspen. I stopped so often to take
pictures that I thought I might never make it to Whitehorse.
Along the road to Whitehorse there is scattered evidence
of the gold rush that brought so many thousands of people
this way the last time a century turned. The towns of
Carcross (Caribou Crossing) and Robinson (now a ghost town)
were two interesting stops.
Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, is a thriving town. It's the
capital of the Yukon Territory. It's located on the Alcan
Highway, a road that connects the U.S. with Alaska through
Canada. The road was built during WWII to help defend
Alaska from Japanese invasion.
The Yukon River flows through Whitehorse and is navigable
from the Yukon's mouth at St. Michael to Whitehorse.
During the goldrush, and afterward, steamboats would ply
the river as far as Whitehorse. The Yukon here is a
clear, fast moving body of water.
I visited a couple of museums in Whitehorse. I might have
taken a canoe trip on the Yukon if it hadn't been so cold,
and if the outfitters weren't closed for the winter.
The drive back to Skagway was more beautiful than the drive
to Whitehorse. Many of the morning clouds had cleared and
the sun was shining brightly off the mountain's snowy peaks
and the golden aspen leaves.
Upon returning to the hostel, my home in Skagway, I found
the other guests heading out for supper at a local Chinese
buffet. I went along and ate very well.
It had been a wonderful day of exploration and discovery.
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