Skagway still bringing in the Gold

Since Jim hasn't had any luck panning for gold, maybe we will be able to strike gold in Skagway! Probably not, but that is what thousands of people were hoping when they arrived in Skagway and climbed the Chilkoot Pass to get to the Klondike. There were two ways to get from Skagway up over the mountains to reach the Yukon River. One was the Chilkoot Pass, and the other was the White Pass. When you drive down into Skagway, you follow the White Pass downhill. Way downhill!

We went to the National Historical Site in town, and arrived just in time to take a walking tour. That is the Visitor's Center behind the Ranger that once was the location of the Alaskan Brotherhood. The front of the building is faced with driftwood. The sidewalks are all boardwalks and the whole place has a western air to it.


Inside the National Historical Site building, there are displays about how arduous it was to climb over the mountains. You also have to cross the Canadian border, and the Royal Mounted Police took over the crossing, and enforced the law that every man coming into Canada had to have a year's supply of food and equipment with him. And for most of the travelers, that meant carrying it up on their back, one load at a time.
Unfortunately for them, by the time they reached the gold strikes in Dawson City, all the land had been claimed, and there was nowhere for them to mine.

But Skagway survived, and now is a port for the Alaskan Ferry System, a National Historic Site, and a stop for cruise ships! There were four in port the first evening we arrived, and the town was bursting. The shops stay open late, and it is difficult to walk on the boardwalk/sidewalk. In fact, several people just walk in the street. Makes it interesting for the buses and cars that are trying to maneuver. When the gold seekers arrived, there were those that decided to "mine" the goldrushers by fleecing them, aka, Soapy Smith, and there are still merchants that are catering to the cruise ship shoppers. Better than half of the stores were expensive jewelery and diamond stores. The other half were tee shirt and gift shops. At the Visitor's Center, they assured us that each of the next few days would get progressively better as there weren't as many ships expected in port.

This proved to be true, and the town was pretty nice, although a bit eerie with the shops closing early in the evening.

One of the days we were there, we decided to drive back up the White Pass in the Jeep and stop at all the pull outs and scenic views that we had not been able to with the RV.

It was a beautiful day, and we were really glad that we did it. You can see where the White Pass Railroad climbs up the mountain, and see how the land and foliage changes as the mountain becomes harsher.

There are many little lakes at the top of the pass, and that is where they waited for the spring to come, snow to melt, and build boats to get down the lakes and to the river.

Lots of beautiful waterfalls.

This is where the train comes up the mountain. It passed right by the RV park that we picked. Fortunately, they only run during the day, so they were interesting to watch, and didn't keep us awake at night.

Oh, speaking of night! There is one in Skagway! It gets dark!!! Not until after 10:00, but never the less, it is dark at night.



And, speaking of RV Parks. We have had quite a bit of luck with campgrounds. Some are nicer than others, and we haven't had much trouble finding them by using the Trailer Life book, and Alaskan Camping by a couple named Church. However, this time they both missed the boat. The first RV Park we stayed in in Skagway was awful. The facilities were not clean at all and the hook-ups were not what was described in the books. We stayed two nights, checked out the other RV Park nearby, and moved for the rest of our stay. We were able to get a refund for the one night remaining at the first park. When Jim talked to the new park manager, he found out that the owner also owns over half of the tour packages in town, and the park is not his primary interest. No kidding!

We discovered that there was a day trip to Juneau by boat from Skagway. We had a very nice day, were able to hook up with Don and Marilyn who are staying in Haines, Alaska, and see some more whales on the boat trip.

The boat picked us up in Skagway, then went to Haines to pick up a few people, took us to Juneau where we were picked up by a Grey Line bus tour. The bus driver gave us a tour into Juneau, dropped us down town for three hours, and picked us up to take us to Mendenhall Glacier.

While we were in Juneau, we had a very nice lunch, and then walked to the State Museum. There were some really good exhibits there, and some interesting things about the Native Culture, European settlement, and statehood.

And then we hit the road again on the way to Stewart BC, and Hyder Alaska. We decided to drive the RV and the Jeep up the pass to see if that would be easier on the RV. It worked very well, and we were also happy that we had taken our trip up on a sunny day, because it was very rainy and foggy on our way out. There were still buses of daytrippers going up the mountain, stopping at all the overlooks, but they couldn't see much at all. It made for lots of grumpy senior citizens! We told a few of them that it really was pretty, but that didn't impress them. Oh, well.

Jim and Sue