A train journey from Carcross

With my rental car returned in Whitehorse, I caught a bus to Carcross stopping on the way by Emerald Lake once again. Twelve kilometres south of the lake was Carcross—a cute village that I wandered around, peering into tourist shops and along walkways, waiting like everyone else who’d been on the bus, for the train that would follow the gold miners’ trail back to Skagway.

Other treasures of Dawson City

I toured some of the town’s old buildings, many preserved but locked. A guide led us into one of the empty hotels in immaculate condition and the bank with its high wooden counters, no longer in use, filling us with stories from the gold rush era.

Dawson City’s Dome

The Midnight Dome was a metamorphic rock that rose almost nine hundred metres above its surroundings. From as far back as the late 1900s, people gathered on The Dome to watch the sunset close to midnight, then rise a couple of hours later. It was a destination I was keen to explore, so I set out from Dawson City hiking by the built-up dyke and passed the swirling Yukon as far as the tailings at the junction with the Klondike River. These piles of stones left by gold seekers remained even close to town. Journeying on foot, I trudged up to The Dome—a hill that overlooked Dawson City, the Klondike Valley, and the Yukon River.

The casual ambience of Dawson City

Dawson City was once a booming gold rush town. I’d visited other gold rush towns—Ballarat, Bendigo, Hill End, Barkerville, but this one oozed natural friendliness.

Airline security, or not

After reading experiences of drivers travelling the Yukon’s Demster Highway, I decided it wasn’t for me. The day before I left Inuvik, a tourist had busted his motorbike on the dirt road coming north, so I knew I’d made the right decision to fly in and out of the northern town.