Dawson City to Tatchun Creek, YT: Yukon is burning!

Spent an uneventful night on the Yukon River--it was kind to us. Recently, it has not been so kind to the town of Eagle, AK, which is a bit downstream. It is/was a very well preserved old town, known for trapping. We were told that earlier in the year, during the ice break up, warm weather upstream melted the ice, but downstream things remained locked up. An ice dam formed near Eagle and resulted in rather severe flooding of the town. Apparently the river is usually 10 feet below the level of the town, but the ice dam that formed was 16 feet above the level of Eagle.Here is the little ferry that takes folks across the river. You can see how hazy it is because of the forest fires.

A typical building in Dawson. We relaxed in town for the morning and met lots of nice people from all over the place.

In the afternoon, we attended a tour of the Robert Service cabin. It was outstanding--we were spellbound by Johnny, the guy who gave the presentation. He had everyone laughing with his delivery of several poems, and the story of Robert Service is fascinating.

Heeeeeere's Johnny!

So, about the smoke...we had planned next to take the Dempster Road up to Inuvik in the Northwest Territories, crossing over the Arctic Circle one more time. The views are supposed to be spectacular, but because of the fact that 1/2 of the Yukon seems to be on fire, you couldn't see much, according to the folks at the Visitor Center. We reluctantly passed the turnoff to the Dempster and headed south...it will have to wait for our next trip.

We rode for about 4 hours to a campground on a creek. Saw a coyote and a lynx along the way. Mark caught the smallest fish in the universe, barely visible to the naked eye. I got skunked.

Odometer: 7315 miles