Last Saturday we departed on a multi-day expedition to travel the Yukon River from Whitehorse to Dawson City by boat. 740 km / 460 miles. I’m not going to call this a trip… or a vacation… this was an expedition!

We made arrangements to have a week available for this expedition.

A bit of geography and history before I dive into our expedition recap!

The Yukon River was always the Yukon’s main highway, until an actual highway was constructed in the 1950’s. (But even that one was gravel until the 1980’s.) It is a major river, flowing from northern British Columbia, up through the Yukon territory, and west into Alaska. It empties into the Bering Sea.

The river facilitated trade and travel into the territory. Trading posts were established to trade furs and goods with the Indigenous people. When the Klondike Gold Rush sparked a stampede, tens of thousands of people travelled to the Dawson City area via the Yukon River. Sternwheeler steamboats started regular travel up and down the river, bringing goods and supplies to the entire region (when the river isn’t frozen).

I had thought that one day I’d travel the river via a canoe. It’s a significant, brisk-flowing river, and it flows south to north, so you could theoretically just pop a raft in the water in Whitehorse and eventually end up in Dawson City, right?

But once Jeff settled his sights on our 16 foot Stryker inflatable boat, the idea of floating with a bit of luxury (40 horsepower motor) certainly was appealing.

But like any pending unknown challenge, I admit I was feeling apprehensive, nervous, and a bit anxious in the last few days over the idea of spending a week in the remote wilderness. But regardless of my apprehension, we were doing this!

We spent a couple of weeks narrowing our packing and supply list, doing local trips with our boat in the river here to gauge how much fuel we’d need to bring with us. Logistically, there weren’t too many hurdles. The river between Whitehorse and Dawson City has one town – Carmacks. So we’d have one place, a bit less than half way, where we’d have a cell signal, and where we could visit a store and gas station to refill our gas jugs.

Hank was one of our biggest decisions to make. Should he come with us? Would he sit still in the boat? Would he sleep at night in the tent after a day of no exercise? How would he do if it rained? Would he keep the bears away? Or attract them? I knew he would be a real big stressor for this trip, so we booked him into a boarding kennel in Whitehorse (our local shelter is too full of puppies looking for homes).

It was the weekend of the Dawson City Music festival. The incredibly loud party that is held just a half block from our house and shakes our walls for three days. What a great time to not be here!

We left Dawson at 4:30 a.m. on Saturday to head to Whitehorse, pulling the boat on its trailer. Along the road south of Stewart Crossing, where the wildfire has been burning, we saw a moose with two little baby calves with her. Glad to see they were doing okay despite the smoke.

Once we got to Whitehorse, we dropped off Hank and ran around doing some last-minute errands. My rubber boots cracked just this week, and were leaking severely, so I picked up a new pair of Muck boots that go almost to my knee. Perfect!

Jeff had ordered a couple waterproof blue barrels that people often use for boat trips, but they didn’t arrive in time! So we packed our food and gear in 3 plastic action-packer containers, three waterproof bags, and various odds and ends. Jeff strategically packed every tool and replacement part we’d need for the boat. We decided to minimize our gear and not bring food we had to cook. That would mean no cooler, no pots or pans, no washing dishes. It seemed simpler. We’d bring a little Jetboil stove so we could boil water, have dehydrated meals that just need boiling water. At the last minute before departing, the forecast turned warm! That led to us backtracking on the new cooler option, and we splurged for a Yeti cooler, ice, and some pops before launching in the river. We also brought a couple dozen bagels, salami, and cream cheese. And instant oatmeal for breakfast. Jeff dried moose and made two flavours of jerky for the trip too!

Our friend Shane lives in Whitehorse now, and he offered to store Jeff’s truck and the boat trailer for the week. Perfect! We picked him up and took him to the boat ramp in downtown Whitehorse.

(It sure is nice to see Jeff’s truck back again, isn’t it? It is finally fully repaired after a couple years of trouble!)

But oh boy…. where is all this stuff going to go? I thought we packed light? And my Dad really wanted to join us on this voyage but wasn’t able to make it. Where would he have sat? I think on top?

Our Stryker boat came with a bimini canopy for sun and rain. We weren’t sure we wanted it, because when it folds down it is really in the way, but decided with the change in forecast, a bit of shade would be nice? So on it went!

We removed the metal benches that come with the boat, and decided to sit in our big comfy lawn chairs. Smart, right? Sure beats sitting in a canoe!

Around 1:30pm, we were off!

It was suddenly all too real! There we were, floating down the Yukon River through downtown Whitehorse, waving to people on the waterfront boardwalk like we were in a parade!

We were going slow, getting everything settled and organized in the boat. The water was such a beautiful turquoise colour.

We set out with some other people who were in canoes, and a big dragon boat, and for the first bit we were all going the same speed.

Jeff was excited to try out his new replacement depth sensor / fish sensor. His old one was no longer reliable (it kept telling us we had over 100 feet of water depth below us, and then blank out.) Fortunately, this purchase made it just in time! There are so many sandbars and shoals in the Yukon River, knowing when we were in shallow water may just save a broken prop, or worse!

I dug out my binoculars, and right away we started seeing wildlife. Bald eagles! I bet they were looking for the fish that Jeff was marking on his fish finder!

Although it wasn’t too long before I pulled on my wind jacket! Despite being warm, there is a cold breeze on this river!

Have you ever seen a happier man?

This stretch of river is so beautiful!

We were heading out of Whitehorse towards where the Takhini River joins the Yukon. There is a bridge there, where the Klondike Highway goes over the Yukon River. The water gets a bit silty when the Takhini joins, taking away from the clear turquoise, but it was still quite beautiful!

Have you started to realize that this post is going to be picture heavy? Well not just this one. This is only day one! I’ll be putting together a video with our video clips later too. (I hope you’re not still on dial-up internet speeds.)

Rather than speed past any of these beautiful scenes, Jeff had the motor set pretty slow so we could soak it all in!

I had no idea there were so many planes on floats around Whitehorse! There were several parked along this stretch of the river.

And these two had their own horses!

We had one goal today, if it was going to be possible. We wanted to get across Lake Laberge. Laberge is famous for its ferocity. It can blow up a choppy storm often, forcing boaters to head for the banks. Remember Lake Laberge? It’s well known thanks to Robert Service’s poem “The Cremation of Sam McGee”:

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
      By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
      That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
      But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
      I cremated Sam McGee.

From: The Cremation of Sam McGee by Robert Service

It’s a big deep lake – about 50 km long and ranges from 2 to 5 kilometres wide. We needed enough time to cross it, yet needed to also give ourselves permission to spend the night somewhere along the way if the conditions were poor.

There were some clouds building in the sky ahead of us, but the river was nice up to this point! There were paddlers out for the afternoon, and it was neat to see little camps along the river.

And then we were there! Lake Laberge lay head of us!

As we entered the lake, it got choppy!!

We admitted to each other later, we were both a bit nervous about it.

The waves went BANG BANG BANG on the hull and bottom of our inflatable boat.

I still had a bit of cell signal, so I checked our progress. We had a long way to go! (We were travelling south to north.)

Look how deep this lake is! Jeff took this picture at 335 feet deep!! He said the deepest he spotted was 469 ft!!

There is one part where the lake narrows, near the campground. We pointed straight for that opening:

And then the lake got even calmer!

All the advice was to hug the right shore going down the lake. That way you could get to the shore if the water got too rough. Since it wasn’t, at that moment, Jeff just gunned it right down the middle. He had it up to 32 km/hr at one point!

I put socks on, and my new rubber boots. And a toque! Jeff put on pants!

Jeff had his focus on getting us to a campsite he knew was at the far end of the lake, just inside the start of the 30 Mile stretch of the river.

We made it!!

The campsite was easy to spot, and no one else was there!

It was right on the river, and really easy to pull ashore.

There were picnic tables and a fire pits, and several spots for many campers!

Jeff tied up the boat and we started hauling our stuff out of the boat. Pretty much all of it, so we could figure out where everything was, and what we’d need for the night.

We pulled out the tent and started setting it up.

And then it started to pour rain.

Hurry!!! Get the fly on that tent!

Ahhhhhh!!!!!! Pouring rain while sunny. ‘Tis the Yukon way!

A big bald eagle across the river was screaming at us while we scrambled. Everything was getting wet, but what are you going to do? We’re living outside now!

We flipped our lawn chairs over on shore and shoved things underneath.

Then we noticed a sign pointing to the toilets. There were outhouses! Nice!

This site marks the start of the historical 30 Mile section of the river, and is the spot the firstly named Casca sternwheeler was left to rot. Some of her hull is still on the beach and nails from the hull litter the shore.

This site also had a North West Mounted Police post, a telegraph station, a roadhouse, and supply depots. And some of them are still here!!

Feeling rather indifferent to the rain, we set off to explore.

There were relics everywhere!

And the last thing I expected was to find a truck!

Wait, maybe not the last thing I expected. There was also fresh horse poop here. How did horses get here? On the far end of Lake Laberge, on the opposite side of the lake and river from the road system?

No idea. But we did find a trail leaving this area at the far end of the cabins we found. Were they wild horses? Or part of an adventure with an outfitter? No idea.

Here’s a peek inside the first cabin.

Here’s another out back.

This one has been preserved:

A peek inside through the screens showed the recent work:

This cabin really stood out:

It’s been used as a trapline cabin now, but was clearly once the telegraph office!

Oooof, it’s not in great shape anymore.

But it’s clearly the telegraph office that I learned later was built by Edward Morrison in 1935. It was meant to have the telegraph office in the front and a residence behind it.

It now has all the tell tale evidence of a trapline cabin, skiis, tobaggan, shovels, etc.

I don’t think anyone could possibly still stay here while working their trapline now though. It’s a bit breezy!

Here’s the trail heading out of this community to the north along the river:

Anyway, back to camp!

We put our tent in a bit of shade between some shrubs.

And spread our gear everywhere! And hung some stuff up to dry!

There were ducks in the water, and fish kept jumping right behind our boat! But there were also tons of horseflies and mosquitos. Jeff lit a couple of mosquito coils and we ate a dehydrated meal for supper.

There was tons of firewood on this site, but it was so warm we didn’t feel the need to have one.

We stashed our food storage containers in the woods and hoped all the chattering squirrels were going to leave them alone.

And here ends the first great day of our expedition! We did about 90 km and only used a half tank of gas.

Stay tuned for day two!