Top O' The World To Ya'

There are two ways to drive to Alaska from Dawson in the Yukon.  The one that doesn't involve going all the way back to Whitehorse is called the Top Of The World Highway.  It starts with a ferry ride across the Yukon River from Dawson to...well, nowhere.  We were not the only people in Dawson who thought of taking the short cut.

Everyone lined up on the outskirts of the city and waited patiently.  More or less.  Our wait was an hour and a half. There was no dock, just some dirt piled up on both shores.  The current was very strong.  The ferry would back off the sand then get swept downstream.  Then it fought its way back upstream until it sort of collided with the sand.  The captain then turned it and poured on the power to hold it in position while we drove off.  In a 22,000 pound motor home.  They don't do this all the time.  In the winter you drive across on the river, which was solid ice until about two weeks before our crossing.

We had met a couple from New Mexico at the campground.  Jack and Gayle were driving a big truck with even larger Montana fifth wheel trailer (photo at left).  When the young girl directing traffic onto the ferry motioned us aboard, then added Jack and Gayle, we thought the whole boat would have to sink.  





But they added three cars to the load and shoved off across the river.  The shot below shows the infrastructure at the start and finish.  The river sweeps it away all the time, but they just dump more dirt and go on.

So we rolled off with a huge sigh of relief.  I think Gayle was still holding her breath in the truck next to us.  She had asked earlier how deep I thought the river was. I told her it didn't matter...

The Top Of The World Highway runs across a series of high ridges about 4000 ft above sea level.  Not high by our standards, but the valleys on both sides were at sea level.
So we were enjoying a dirt road that drops off on both sides.  And sharing with with big trucks.

We had seen snow along the roadside in Dawson, so it came as no surprise when we encountered it up on the Top O' The World.

After 67 miles and perhaps two hours we saw this odd sight. It was a border crossing sitting way up high in the middle of nowhere.  On the international boundary.  It wasn't like the border station in Tubac.  No dogs.  As we screeched up the U.S. side (with a rock stuck in a brake caliper) the DHS guy asked where we were coming from.  I assumed he knew we'd been in Dawson, the only place you could possibly be coming from on this road, so I said, "Arizona."  That seemed to work as a password, and we sailed on down the steep hills, back in the U.S.A.

 After another two hours of slow driving on even worse roads, we arrived in an old mining camp.  This is the first community on the U.S. side. The miners noted the abundance of ptarmigans in the area and were going to name it after the prairie chicken.  But couldn't agree on how to spell "ptarmigan."  I suppose 100 years ago their laptops didn't have spell checkers (whew).  So they punted and named the town Chicken.


A week earlier they had a rock festival there that they must have seen as a smaller version of Woodstock.  They naturally called it ChickenStock.

We stopped for a late lunch at the Chicken Creek Cafe.  The Jeep looked like it had just survived WWII.  Dirt everywhere. Inside and out.

By 5:00 pm we had come out at the Alcan Highway again after experiencing the worst roads on the whole trip, which were south of Chicken.  After a night in the metropolis of Tok, we continued on to Delta Junction, which had been the other starting point for the Alaska Highway construction during WWII. The Jeep felt right at home.

In Junction we found a visitor center that featured huge mosquito sculptures (which we would find out later were life sized...

...and a monument marking the end (or beginning) of the Alcan.


We headed northwest towards Fairbanks.  I would say we headed northwest into the setting sun, but by now we have figured out it never sets.


Yesterday was the longest day of the year.  We'll tell you about last night's (sunny) Midnight Sun Festival in another issue in a day or so.


Oh, I almost forgot:  I wanted to show you the matching wedding rings Marsha and I got in Dawson.  They call them "slucebox" rings because they are said to resemble a slucebox filled with gold nuggets.  Our are filled with 22 carat nuggets found in streams around Dawson.  Real Klondike Gold.

John and Marsha