Yukon River

Tracy's Yukon Adventure

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On the 29^th of June, I finally get underway on paddling trip. We had driven 4000 miles over 11 day--broken down twice�so I was ready to be on the water. I made arrangements for Kanoe People, a river outfitter in Whitehorse, Yukon Territories, to drive me to the Teslin River, a tributary of the Yukon River. I had originally planned to put in at the headwaters of the Yukon, Lake Bennett, but since I was paddling alone, I figured it would be safer to avoid a lot of lake paddling. It gets very windy on these lakes, with choppy conditions, and a water temperature of 45 degrees. A capsize in these conditions could be very hazardous. The route I settled on, 125 miles on the Teslin, then the remainder of the trip on the Yukon River to Dawson would be approximately 70 miles further, but considerably safer.

Kanoe People picked up me and my canoe at our campsite at Whitehorse and drove me about an hour and a half south of Whitehorse to Johnson�s Crossing on the Teslin River. I shared a van with two college age women from Vancouver and a German fellow, both renting canoes and gear from Kanoe People. This is my first hint that I might not get a lot of solitude on this trip. When we get to the river, it takes me no time to pack my gear in the canoe and get on the water. I feel with a little strong paddling, I can leave this crowd behind and have the river to myself.

The river is very full and fast. Unseasonably warm temperatures (highs in the 90�s) have melted snow and ice that normally remains frozen throughout the summer, so all the Yukon Rivers are just shy of flood stage. The warm temperatures have also increased the fire danger; there has been no measurable precipitation since the last snow in April. There are many boils, whirlpools and eddies that I am not used to paddling in, so it is a steep learning curve that afternoon. I paddle 25 miles in four hours, finding a nice campsite around 5:30 PM, just as a line of thunderstorms move through. At this rate, I can tell the trip will not take as long as I had anticipated.

30 June. Wake to torrential, frog strangling rain. I lay in my tent for an hour, hoping the rain will stop. Thinking it won�t, I get up prepare breakfast and strike camp in a downpour. Everything that is not waterproofed (my sleeping bag and clothes) are soaked as I pack. As soon as the canoe is loaded and I get underway, the rain stops. I sight numerous Bald eagles throughout the day, and get a special thrill when I see a Moose and calf cross the river in front of me. The amount of water in the river is amazing, with little effort I can average 11-12 miles per hour. The river sometimes follows a steep gradient down hill, but with no obstructions in the water, the river flow just speeds up with no rapids. When this fast water hits a curve in the river, it produces odd back eddies and boils; these can turn the canoe around and move it form one side of the river to the other. I find if I stay in the main river flow, instead of one side or the other, this affect is minimized. After paddling from 7:30 to 2:00, I find a nice campsite and stop for the day. The previous night�s camp was somewhat brushy and buggy; this one by comparison is fairly open, with very few mosquitoes. Spend the afternoon drying out my gear, cooking dinner and relaxing. At 8:00 pm I go to bed, only to be awakened shortly thereafter by the sounds of the Vancouver ladies arriving to share my campsite.

1 July. Arise early, determined to make enough miles to leave Vancouver behind. Weather is sunny and nice, temperatures in the seventies. Sight several moose throughout the day as well as Bald Eagles and Loons. Eagles seem to be staking out likely salmon fishing spots, the annual salmon run is anticipated within a week or so. Paddle 65 miles in eight hours, meeting the Yukon River at the village of Hootalinqua in the early afternoon. The difference in clarity between the Yukon and Teslin Rivers is shocking. The Teslin has picked up some sediment, so is fairly cloudy. I paddle over the junction of the Yukon; the water is so clear as to be startling. I can see 15-20 feet down to the bottom of the river, sparkling clean and pure. Camp at Hootalinqua, take pictures of the old buildings, sharing camp later in the evening with a German couple.

2 July. More sunny weather, almost hot. Sight more eagles throughout the day. Meet another German fellow on the water later in the day while searching for a campsite. He is paddling a folding canoe he brought with him from Germany. Camp in an old wood yard built back in the day to provide wood for the steamboats that plied these waters from the 1890�s to 1950 or so. So many people have camped in this spot over the years that there are very few trees, and the ground is nothing but ash from all the campfires. Steep cliff across the river, in the night lightning from a thunderstorm ignites a fire, I can see and smell the smoke and hear trees popping and crackling across the river. Break camp quickly and move downstream.

3 July. Paddle five hours to Carmacks, the first community I meet on the river. Meet the German with the folding canoe on the river, a pleasant fellow named Dietor. Agree to meet at the Carmacks campground. Carmacks seems to be an important stop, as shortly after Carmacks is the notorious Five Finger Rapids, the only challenging rough water of the trip. I want to rest at Carmacks to be fresh for the rapids, as well as to get a little shopping done. When I get to Carmacks, I find the campground is in much disarray, litter everywhere, beer cans, dirty diapers, household trash. It has the look of a teenager party spot, and the surly teenagers cruising the campground make me feel this is not the place to camp by myself for the night. As I sit there wondering what to do, I meet a bicyclist �Dan� from Vancouver. We agree to camp together to watch each other�s back and belongings. Dietor the German arrives later, he too is shocked at the conditions of the campground. He has made this trip three times, and only this year has the place looked so badly. Dietor has a 12 foot spear he uses for bear protection, with the spear and bear spray Dan and I both have, we feel confident we can �repel boarders� in the night. Later, a Japanese paddler �Yoshie� joins us. Now we have four tents on one campsite, the circling teens seem to back off now.

Dan has cycled from Vancouver hoping to join a canoeist on the river, any canoeist will do. He will paddle with some one or by himself, the only problem being the folks who rent canoes will not allow anyone to go past Carmacks with their canoes. The high water levels are problematic at Five Finger Rapids, and forest fires are numerous between Carmacks and Dawson City. So he intends to camp at Carmacks until he can join forces with a solo canoeist with his own boat to paddle to Dawson. As my boat is �Solo� only, I can�t help him. He has clipped and saved every newspaper article that has appeared in Vancouver newspapers about drowning deaths at Five Finger Rapids, he shares each of them with me: �Vancouver man missing after canoe mishap at Five Finger Rapids.� �German tourist drowns at Five Finger Rapids,� etc. etc. He knows I will be paddling the rapids tomorrow, so can only assume he wants to ensure I am prepared. Dietor has paddled them three times, and assures me there will be no problem, �You vill not even get zee spray in zee boat!� I spend a very restless night listening to the youth of Carmacks, drinking, cursing, cruising through the campground, squealing tires, loud stereos. Every footstep I here is someone coming to steal my gear. Carmacks seems to be a very hopeless place.

4 July. Awake early, determined to leave Carmacks behind, and conquer Five Fingers Rapids. Five Finger Rapids does have a very grim history, during the gold rush of 1898 it claimed many lives, mainly due to poorly constructed rafts and boats. A dramatic if not outrageous description of Five Fingers Rapids from the gold rush days: �Beyond these dangerous rapids there was a small police station on shore, and near it a special sort of net was stretched across the river so that all the people that were drowned could be caught in it and their identity established. The water is very rough for about a mile before reaching this net, and we were constantly tossed up and down. If anyone manages to get safely past this spot at the moment they have taken corpses out of the water, they are obliged to dig a grave and bury one corpse on a hill overlooking the river. This work is compulsory, and each miner is paid ten dollars for the task.� Sounds far fetched, but the rapids do continue to take lives today, mainly the unprepared, and those who do not follow directions for safe passage. Five basalt columns rise for the riverbed, forming channels the river must run between. The four channels to the left are impassable, many obstructions and class five rapids, not navigable by canoe or small boat. The channel to the far right is passable, no more than class two rapids. Much work has been done to make this channel safer, so much that steamboats passed through here routinely from the early 1900�s to the 1950�s, when the highway made river traffic obsolete.

I made preparations for the rapids by tying in my essential gear, food, tent and sleeping bag. I placed waterproofed matches, smokes and flares in my life preserver, made sure I was wearing warm clothes. I hugged the right shore as I approached the rapids, sighting the rock columns in plenty of time to set myself up. As I went through the right channel, the river took a sudden drop; several large standing waves were waiting for me as I went through. The first gave me a thorough drenching; each successive wave put a little more water in the boat. Probably five waves in all, the result being ankle deep water in the boat. Made the canoe feel a little bow heavy, but not unmanageable. I found a spot downstream where I could bail and sponge out the boat, and that was it for Five Finger Rapids.

I continued down river, passing the community of Minto, the last place where there is road access before Dawson, a distance of almost 200 miles. Many canoeists and touring companies were cutting their trips short here, as the wild fires from here to Dawson had gotten quite bad. I pressed on, started looking for a place to camp around 4:00 PM. The river had gotten very swampy, with very little high ground. The high water levels weren�t helping much. I found a nice sandbar, as my canoe touched bottom, a mother moose and two calves stepped out of the bushes. Not wanting to argue with a 1000-pound moose, I paddled on, finally finding high ground at Fort Selkirk 20 miles later. Eighty miles total paddled today in nine hours. Meet a German group of approximately eight paddlers who have been held up by their tour company in Germany as a result of the fires down river. The leader of the group is in satellite phone communication with tour headquarters back home, he has not been allowed to proceed until conditions improve. I think to myself if they are waiting for conditions to improve they might be here come September. There have been a lot of fires and smoke.

Fort Selkirk is not a bad place to be stuck. Situated high above the Yukon River, near the confluence of the Pelly River, it has been a settlement for approximately 100 years. Few trees, so there are few bugs. Many old buildings remain in good condition, as there are no termites or other wood boring insects in the Yukon. Two churches remain, Catholic and Anglican. A community of First Nations People (Native Americans) keeps the buildings and campground in good shape.

I quiz the tour group leader as what exactly keeps him here in Fort Selkirk. He assures me it is only his tour group that has denied him further travel on the river; no one in authority has told him he cannot proceed. I decide to press on tomorrow.

5 July. Very smoky, cloudy and cool today. Rain showers off and on today. Fires on both sides of river. Sight one moose while talking to yet another German group of paddlers. All in heavily overloaded canoes, some three to a canoe with heavy packs and gear. No wonder German tourists drown at Five Finger Rapids. 65 miles paddled in eight hours.

6 July. Another very smoky day, much reduced visibility. Fire still burns on both sides of the river. Rain on and off makes me appreciate my new high tech rain gear. Took shelter off the river during two thunderstorms, watched lightning strikes start fires all over hillsides along river. At confluence of White and Yukon rivers, silt from White river turns water very muddy. Water no longer drinkable from here on, water must be drawn from side streams. Make camp on a muddy sand bar, thunderstorm pulls up all my tent pegs, hurls my camp chair into the river.

7 July. Arrive in Dawson today around 1100. Some surprised to see me, as they say river travel has been closed for several days now as a result of the fires. Surprises me, as I have seen no one in authority since leaving Whitehorse. Dawson Trading Post helps me recover my gear and makes arrangements for canoe and gear to be trucked back to Whitehorse. I will ride the bus back tomorrow on an old school bus, nine hour trip. Total miles traveled approximately 500 in just over seven days.