August 3 - Skagway

This is the true color of the lake enroute Skagway

We arrived in Skagway in the afternoon after crossing through customs and the  canada/US border. We drove the Klondike Highway down  into the town which has to be one of the most gorgeous drives of the trip. Have we said that before?

Mirror image!!!!!

This is the other side of the road from previous photo!!

Do you believe this view?

We drove into town and parked. The people we bought the camper from have summer jobs in Skagway so I gave them a call.   Linda was parked a block away from where we were as she was picking up her husband Laurie. He works for the White Pass and Yukon Railroad.  When we bought the camper he had told us that if we ever got to Skagway he would get us passes on the train so I wanted to collect. We had a wonderful  short visit with them  and made plans to meet them for dinner the next night.

Skagway was built on the Klondike Gold Rush and there is a lot of history relating to that there. Very interesting.  Unfortunately it is also a cruise ship stop and there were 4 in town that day. Not nearly as bad as it was in Ketchikan although there are some company stores here too.  We were tired and headed back out of town to a NPS campground. It was around the other side of the Taiya Inlet from the town. Quiet night and did we sleep.

Toured the town the next day. We liked it but never could get on the internet. The library only had one computer and all the people in there with laptops had overload the band and it was down. We meet up with Lauri and Linda for a great dinner. They said it was a little deja vue to see the camper parked on the town street. Lauri gave me a pass to ride the train the next day. It goes up along the side of the mountain and  up to the summit so therefore Garry didn't want to go. Heights.

That night we decide to drive out 9 miles to camp on "The Flats" out at Dyea. This is free and we just had to register our intent  with  the police dept. This is at the site of the other town that sprang up during the gold rush days. At one point it was bigger than Skagway. The miners at Dyea took the 33 mile Chilkoot Pass up to the summit at an altitude of   2865 feet. The miners out of Skagway took the White Pass trail - it was 10 miles longer but its summit was less steep and 600 feet lower.  I could write a lot more about the gold rush but I won't. Anyway Dyea eventually ceased to be as Skagway had a better port. So off we went to spend the night out on the flats. We had heard that a grizzly bear fished for Salmon along the creek bed. Sure enough he showed up @ 8:30PM.

First night bear - Is this close???

 There were several people from town out there to see him too. He ambled along on the other side of the creek from us paying no attention to any of us. What a thruill. We were parked about 25 feet from the creek bank and the creek itself was about 25 feet across so he got very close to us. The creek is only between 1 - 2 feet deep and there was Salmon in the creek. After he ambled away we went to bed. At 11 PM I heard all this splashing outside my window. It is getting dark now around 11 so in the dusk I was able to make out his silhouette as he was splashing after fish. Unable to get a picture because it was too dark. He disappeared around the bend in the creek and we went back to sleep only to hear him splashing around again about an hour later. We have our night vision monocular with us and we were able to see his antics. He caught a fish and dragged it up on the opposite bank. Someone rode out at that time on a motorcycle and the bear dropped the fishing and ran off. They can really run fast! That was the last we saw/heard him that night. The next morning we looked around and there were several fish carcasses in front and in back of the camper. WOW!!!!

We drove into town the next day and I took the train ride. It was wonderful. I was on the other side of the gorge we had driven along coming into town. This construction  has been placed alongside the Eiffel Tower and the Panama Canal in its engineering marvel. We went over the most unbelievable (high) trestle bridges over canyons and through 2 mountains. I really enjoyed the ride  but was so tired from bear watching all night the night before that I dozed on the way down.

One of many trestles.

Now you see why Garry wouldn't go with me.

 I arrived back in town at 4:15 and we headed back out to the flats for another night. Of course I was hoping to see the bear again. Well we waited and waited but by 9:30 he hadn't shown up so we went to bed.  This time we were parked facing the other way and Garry woke me at midnight because the bear was back. We watched for awhile and went back to sleep only to hear him again an hour later. He ambled off down the creek and we went to sleep again. At 5 it was daylight and he again woke us up with all the splashing. I got a video and great pictures of him this time. He even walked right beside the camper. I hardly breathed as I had the window down taking pictures.  I have never had so much fun NOT getting any sleep. What a thrill.

You can see our camper mirror at the bottom of this photot. This was a CLOSE encounter.

One of our last nights in Alaska and we finally got the close encounter in the wild that we had been hoping for. What a thrill!!! I was sorry to leave Skagway the next day as I wanted to see him again.