Day 4 - Wednesday, August 05

We woke up in Whitehorse but right at 9:30 we left the capital of the Yukon heading north to Takhini Hot Springs. It was just 25 kms away. The pool was really nice and warm, of course, a nice muscle relaxer after days in the car! We just sat there completely relaxed when suddenly I hear some Portuguese. There was a Brazilian couple in Takhini!!!! Silvia and Talvino are from Curitiba but have been living in Vancouver for a little while. Like us, they are driving to Alaska. It was nice to talk Portuguese in this part of the world! Nice people.

We left Takhini Hot Springs at 1:30pm heading north on the Klondike hwy to Dawson City. The drive was even more empty but beautiful. It was also very hazy because of the forest fires and unfortunately we didn't see ANY wildlife, not even birds! We are still looking for Grizzlies! We got to Dawson City at 6:30 and WHAT A SURPRISE!!!! I've heard of it, but had no idea how much fun this is.

For those who don't know, Dawson City was the centre of the gold rush in the end of last century. Gold was found here in 1896 and thousands of people (literally) moved up here in search of the yellow richness. In 1897 the population jumped from around a 1000 people to 60.000! But that didn't last for too long. In a couple of years the gold was gone and so were the people who came because of it, most of them went back still poor, if not poorer. What is rich here is the history. I don't have too much time to write about it, but I recommend anyone interested to look it up - really worth it! But what is fascinating about this 1700 people town (in the summer), is the condition of the place. Dawson City is a historic city preserved by the government of Canada and Parks Canada runs most of the historic building here. Actually, there are very few original buildings still standing, due to many fires that happened along the years here. But the whole town is like it used to be in the end of the 1800s. Replicas of the saloons, bank, post office, churches, etc, show tourists from all over the world what the gold rush was about. According to our tour guide (highly recommended Parks Canada tour, only $6.30) at that point Dawson was the largest city west of Winnipeg and north of San Francisco and had the highest land value in the world!

We ended the evening with some entertainment and lots of Yukon beer, of course! We did some bar hopping but spent most of the evening at the Diamond Tooth Gerties Casino, the oldest casino in Canada. We watched 2 of their 3 evening shows with lots of music and can can dancers. Mike had an amazing time, especially when the lead singer came very close and sang for him... and of course she did the same thing to another 100 men in the hall.

We are staying in the Yukon River Hostel, right in the other side of the river. It's a fun place, very rustic, with no electricity. For $46 a night we have our own cabin and washes ourselves in the bath house, with a wood stove and buckets to splash the water. Who needs shower? The owner of the hostel is this fun German character (his name is Dietel, " it sounds just like Peter with a D") who operates the hostel - which he built by himself - during the summer (May to September) and travels around the world in the winter. He's been to Brazil, including Florianopolis and Blumenau, of course. To get to the other side of the river, we need to get in very small a ferry boat that runs 24 hours on demand and fits about 6 cars.
Wow, one of the most fun days, so far. I totally recommend Dawson City!!!

Day 4 balance

Kms: 550
Hours of driving: 5 hours

From to: Whitehorse to Dawson City
Animal: none...again!
Curiosity: most of the tourists here are Americans and over 60 years old.
Curiosity: so far, 7 out of 10 cars on the road are RVs (traillers)