Yukon and Alaskan bears

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The road from Tok in Alaska to Dawson City in the Yukon is called the “Top of the World Highway” with good reason. The road, mostly gravel, climbs up and along a ridge for 66 miles to reach the gold panning hamlet of Chicken, population 17 in summer and just 3 in winter. One of the three is Martha, the postmistress, who actually lives even further into the wild, up her own 20 mile track. Until the late 1940s, Chicken was only accessible from Canada.



The views from the road are of spruce tree lined valleys beyond which tower huge snowy mountains. It is a vast landscape with nothing man-made except the narrow strip of our dirt road – no houses, no huts, not even other tracks. 43 miles past Chicken we reach the border and then it is another 67 miles to the Yukon River ferry.



The mighty Yukon is, indeed, mighty today as there has been a lot of rain further south in British Colombia. The ferry is still running but all other boating is banned due to the strong current.



The ferry brings us to Dawson City which has the air of a film set as all the buildings look as they did during the gold rush; indeed, many are the original building. In 1895 there was almost nothing here and then gold was found in Klondike and Bonanza Creeks. For five to ten years, Dawson was a boom town with dozens of bars, banks and brothels. Then the gold started to run out and corporations moved in with big machinery; the days of staking a claim where one man could dig and pan and become a millionaire were over.



We can, however, still pan for gold in Klondike Creek; it is back breaking work. On the edge of the stream, we stand bent over our pans which are full of 'payload' (or dirt as we might call it). Then water and a vigorous swirling motion separates the grit from the gold – well, that's the theory. Soon we are content to stand-up straight, wash-out our pans and come away wiser but no richer. Kevin, from claim #33, does show us gold he found – he wouldn't say quite where. One nugget is a full ounce, $2,000 at today's prices.



Now as fully-fledged gold prospectors, we spend the evening in Diamond Tooth Gertie's Casino. Here we watch the circa 1898 Can-Can show, eat and drink and sing along with Gertie herself. Unfortunately, due to having found no gold, we are unable to put it all on our lucky number at her roulette table.



Our journey back to Anchorage takes us across the mountains and then south-west through more mountains; there is still a lot of snow, even down at 1000 metres, Early settlers struggled to live in such a challenging environment, today we have solar heating and snowmobiles which makes life easier but it is still amazing that anyone can live all year here.



Our final trip is to Redoubt Bay by float plane to see bears - a 30 minute sea plane flight is the only way to get in, there are no roads nor even a walking trail. The area is known for bears who hunt for salmon at this time of year, and we are not disappointed. We slowly travel in a small boat along the shore of the lake in search of furry animals and then we spot two bears, not on the shore but in the water. Who knew brown bears were good swimmers? They are not only in the water to hunt for salmon, they are also playing around in the water like children. In all we see six bears on land and in the water. They all look very cuddly but make no mistake, these animals are powerful predators. Watching them hunt and play in an unspoilt wilderness is the perfect way to end our time in Alaska.

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