7/9/19 - Day 11 - Quirky Dawson

Main Street
This little community on the edge of nowhere is a quirky throwback in time. Many of the tourist shops are designed to look like  the original klondike goldrush buildings. However, they are next to the real deal with tin siding, moss covered roofs, and floors that slope every which way!


Street Repairs














There are so many idiosyncracies in Dawson. For example, you see dance hall girls, paddlewheel boats, and biplanes.  Also common are rusted out pickups parked next to enormous RV's,  and city streets that are dirt with repair piles left in the center of the street. There is a main highway that has a tiny ferry rather
Examples of Han clothing
than a bridge.

Such a variety of people too. There are visitors from every continent, so many different languages are heard whereever you go. Many of the locals live off-grid year round, including one famous man who lives in a cave across the Yukon River from
Dawson. There are local First Nations Han people  trying to reclaim their history and culture along with other folks who are drawn here by literary works written by Jack London and Robert Service. 


And then there is the sun. During the summer it sort of sets around 12AM, but is rising again by 4, there is never any real darkness. However, during the winter it is the opposite, about four hours of daylight.


Dawson is such a unique place with a colorful history, however our stay is ending. One last Diamond Tooth Gertie show tonight, a ferry across the river to camp, and in the morning we head for the "Top of the World Highway".
Our campsite at the Yukon River Campground
These words by Robert Service, an excerpt from "The Call of the Yukon", about sum up our experience, 
"...The summer—no sweeter was ever;
   The sunshiny woods all athrill;
The grayling aleap in the river,
   The bighorn asleep on the hill.
The strong life that never knows harness;
   The wilds where the caribou call;
The freshness, the freedom, the farness—
   O God! how I’m stuck on it all.

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