OK. Another day and the host said the road would get better. He was right. The road widened, no more driving on the edge of a mountain. We arrived at the "Y" and went right. Someone had paved the road, relatively recently. Glorius, smooth pavement.
We drove to the border, passed into Canada and back to a dirt road. What a waste of money to pave the road for a bit in the middle of the wilderness.
The Top of the World Highway is a ridge road that has been significantly improved since we drove it in 2002. At that time the road was dirt, not even gravel, rocks and potholes all over the road, very narrow. I remember pulling over many times to let someone pass coming at us. Now the road is wide, graveled and smooth. Canada has numerous graveled roads and part of the road. Whatever the Canadians do the composition of their gravel roads are excellent, almost as good as asphalt. The TOW is a ridge road that allows you to see forever.
At the end of the road is the Yukon River. The state provides a free ferry to cross to Dawson City, YT. The Yukon is a fast flowing river so the ferry needs to go upstream, turn, then steer into the landing. The ferry does not have a formal dock, just drops its ramp on to the shore and you drive on to the ferry.
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| In 2002 we glfed this course at 12M. Still daylight |
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| Ferry heading toward the landing |
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| Our dock! |
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| Waiting on the other side |
Dawson City is a fun town. They embrace their heritage by having dirt roads, wood sidewalk. Their stores have names like Klondike Kates, Sourdough Joe, etc. We really enjoy this town.
We are spending 2-3 days here. We are having a little break. When we checked into the campground we asked if there was a place in town to get hair cuts. He said yes, proceeded to call the hairdresser and we have an appt. Great service. We found the hairdresser, she didn't even have our names, just "couple from campground". She gave us both good cuts. Always a challenge on the road.
We were filthy coming off of the TOW.
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| He was waiting in ine for the car wash |
We drove to the "Dome" the next day and did some food shopping, lazy day.
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| Views from the Dome Road |
Our next drive was out to the dredge and the gold panning creek. There were half a dozen people panning. Gold panning is fun, we did it in 2002 and panned gold. Easy to do.
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| Typical Road |
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| Inactive Dredge |
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| Old time equipment |
For the next few weeks, we will be flip-flopping between the US and Canada. Alaska has a thin tail that comes down along the coast of Canada. We just keep our passports handy.
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