Day 9: Dawson City, YT: 551 km

July 7, 2013

It seems that every hill we crest since we passed Fort Nelson reveals another vista that just makes you go “wow”. Today was also beautiful. The weather was great, the roads were usually good and there weren’t any metal grated bridges!

We did encounter a significant number of really slow RVs. 90% of them hauling “toads”. We got pretty good at passing them as our stops were out of sequence. Our intercoms are really helpful for passing.

We had a few gravel sections. I got onto the high loose section and had a few moments of the wobbles. For the next section, I did the right thing and stood up. Dendog was fine through it all.

Dawson City is pretty cool. There are at least two bus loads of people from cruise ships. We had dinner at Klondike Kate’s. It was really good and reasonably priced.

It’s neat to see the two rivers running together yet discernable. Dawson City is at the confluence of the Klondike and Yukon Rivers.

We met some more people from Sarnia today and a nice lady from Oakville. We met her at the “rest stop” at Gravel Lake.

I forgot to turn on SPOT until we were about 25 km into the ride today.

We met a 72 year old from Germany. He had a SPOT around his neck. He is paddling 1000 miles on the Yukon river (downstream). I’m envious. Perhaps next summer 🙂

If you are considering a trip like this and want cell coverage, pick Telus / Bell. Rogers has not had any meanigful coverage since Grande Prairie. Seems every city has Telus coverage. This is not a paid endorsement.

Looks like my bike burned some more oil today. I have spare oil and an extended warranty!

Lot’s of dudes in Dawson have beards. Dendog and I fit right in.

Tomorrow we enter Alaska via the Top of the World Highway and we stay in Tok, AK overnight. It’s a short ride at around 300 km but can take 7 hours or more. Up early and on the road! That’s the plan.