Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Dawson City keeps the Klondike Gold Rush alive.  We set out for Dredge No. 4, nine miles
out of Dawson City.  It was built in 1912 for commercial dredging of the Bonanza Creek. We had a Parks Canada tour guide tell of the history of the largest wooden hull bucket-line dredge in North America.  Crews of only four men worked 8 hour shifts 24 hours per day.  The Canadian Klondike Mining Company had seasonal camps of approximately 120 workers who did everything from thawing the perma frost to clear-cutting the trees, to operating the massive dredge.  Dredge No. 4 is
representative of numerous machines that worked these valleys for gold and deposited all the rock tailings on the shoreline as they moved up the creeks.
 
Afterward we drove up the road past Discovery Claim, where gold was struck on August 17, 1896, to Claim No. 6 now owned by the local visitors bureau.  It provides tourists a place to pan gold at no charge and, more importantly, removes the risk of being shot for claim jumping, as it is still considered a serous offense.  The claim provides an opportunity to relive the days of 98 with a your own shovel and gold pan.  There were about a dozen folks already panning for gold in the creek.  A young family with a  month old baby were camped alongside the creek for a week searching for gold.  Panning is hard work in icy cold water and mosquitoes buzzing around you.  LeRoy and Dick tried their luck at panning for gold but only lasted about 15 minutes.

Enjoyed fish and chips (halibut of course) and a burger at Sourdough Joe's restaurant in downtown.  Later walked down the wooden boardwalks and did some shopping on Front Street.  Tomorrow we all have to load our RVs and cars on a ferry to cross the Yukon River to pickup the highway again.  Then we drive the Top of the World Highway to Chicken, AK.  People in the group are already freaked out about the long wait for the ferry and then driving on the narrow lanes, zero shoulders and steep drop offs on the Top of the World road.