Our international flight from Vancouver, Canada to San Diego left about 9:30am arriving in San Diego about 12:30pm. Our dear friend David picked us up at the airport and shuttled us to our new home at The Glen in Scripps Ranch.

We had anticipated being home on June 9^th so we were very happy to finally be home. We realized that the world with Covid-19 is unpredictable and that we have to prepare for the unexpected on future trips.

We began our journey home on this day from the tiny Dawson City airport where the entire airport is about four-hundred square feet in size. The airport has one check-in counter and the locals all seem to know each other. None of the locals seemed to wear masks or even own one as they were asking for masks at the counter.

Our short seventy-minute flight on Air North from Dawson City took us to the town of Whitehorse where we had a three-hour layover until our next flight. We then took a two-hour flight to Vancouver International Airport where we would spend the night.

Our hotel for the night was the Fairmont Hotel located one floor above the check in counter for the international flights at the airport. A short elevator ride and you are transported to another world. The elegant hotel had spacious beautifully decorated rooms unlike we had seen on this trip. They had a lovely restaurant and lounge with a young woman singing. Many of the rooms, as ours did, overlooked the airport and runway. The hotel was surprisingly quiet given its location above the bustling airport with planes landing and taking off outside.

This morning we started out with coffee and sweets at a local coffee shop called Bonton. The sweets we tried were a cinnamon Bundt cake, a sausage roll and a very chocolate cookie. Our drinks were a hot chocolate for Kent and a Chai latte for me.

Our next stop was at the Parks Canada storefront devoted to the history of Dawson City. They have some very nice historical photos showing how the goldrush changed the city. In the early days, settlers and businesses pitched tents along the riverfront for housing and the selling of goods of all sorts. As more people came to town and prospered, the town grew quickly. Tent homes and businesses alike were rebuilt with wood, some with the finest materials available like wallpaper, Persian carpets and hardwood floors.

The goldrush only lasted a few years before the majority of folks disappointed with the harsh conditions and lack of fast wealth, packed up and headed home. This left the town of Dawson better than it was before the goldrush but having to deal with new issues like abandoned properties, vacant storefronts and a lack of customers. Many of these early buildings are still standing today although a bit worse for wear. Not much was known about building on the permafrost in the soil and so many of the early buildings have settled unevenly into the ground as the heat from the buildings melts the ice in the soil.

After a short rest at our hotel we headed out on a hike to find the community cemetery founded in 1898 after the much smaller cemetery in town was full and more space was needed. The hike took us about thirty minutes from our hotel, mostly uphill, on a dirt road to reach the cemetery. The new cemetery was built on the hillside above town and is still used today. Over the years the cemetery was expanded as the need grew. For such a small town I found it interesting that the cemetery would be divided into multiple cemeteries based on religious affiliation. The cemetery has defined lawns for the Jewish, the St. Mary’s Catholic, the Police, The Masonic and the Fraternal Order of Eagles.

For the most part there are very few headstones in the cemeteries and instead most graves are marked with basic wooden crosses or markers. The Parks Canada office has an entire brochure dedicated to the cemeteries in town including a write up on some of the interesting people who have been buried in the cemetery over the years. Some were made famous for their luck in the goldrush while others were known for their contributions to the community.

By the time we returned to our hotel Kent was exhausted and his legs were hurting. Oh, the joys of getting older!!

In the late afternoon after a needed rest, we headed out into town looking for someplace new to have dinner. Many places were either closed for the day or were not open between lunch and dinner service. We stopped at a restaurant and bar where the sign said “serving a limited menu.”  When asked what the limited menu was, we were told that we could either have a roast beef sandwich or a tuna sandwich. In the end we ended up back at the JJJ Hotel where we had eaten a couple of times before.

After dinner, staying in our room and watching TV was very appealing.

Our first day after being released from quarantine was a partly cloudy and partly sunny day and the temperature climbed to about 65 degrees. We took advantage of our remaining time in town by visiting the local Dawson City Museum. The museum is located in a beautiful two-story colonial style building. The museum has a large collection of photographs, documents and artifacts from the Klondike region and, in particular, from the goldrush days. The display cases, descriptions and historical data were all presented in a clear, crisp and elevated style on par with any fine city museum around the world.

As with much of north America, the local native people were pushed out of their native land at the whim of the white man. Only after twenty-five years of negotiations with the Canadian government was some of the local land released to its rightful owners.

The museum featured many people who made a splash in the Yukon region either for a short amount of time during the goldrush or for a lifetime living in the region. Some well-known for the businesses they owned, one for owning the longest running bordello in town and some for keeping the city alive after the short-lived days of the goldrush. After the goldrush, many businesses closed up and their owners left town as fast as they had arrived, leaving behind buildings filled with merchandise.

Our next stop was the Jack London Museum honoring the famous author who lived in the Klondike for a short time in 1897 and 1898. When Jack was just 21 years old he made his way from Oakland, California, where he was born, to the Klondike, hoping to make it rich.  Instead of making it rich, he found a very difficult life, a very cold winter and a lack of food for the number of residents at the time. His lack of good food led to him getting scurvy which also accounted for his short-lived time in the Klondike.

While Jack did not write during his time in the Klondike, he did gather stories told by the locals over the cold winter. Once back in Oakland, he recovered from the scurvy and he began to write fiction using his experiences in the Klondike as inspiration. Jack wrote prolifically and was one of the most popular and well-paid authors of his time. He made over a million dollars a year in the early 1900’s. On average he wrote three books a year until his untimely death at the age of 40 in Glen Ellen, California, in Sonoma County. Among his most well known books are Call of the Wild, White Fang, The Sea Wolf and Martin Eden.

In the 1960’s the cabin that Jack London lived in during his time in the Klondike was discovered. For years, this cabin location was unknown. The port of Oakland, which has a Jack London Square, agreed to help with the bill to have his cabin brought from the backwoods if they could have half a piece of the historic cabin. It was agreed that the cabin would be disassembled and split equally between Oakland and Dawson City. The cabin was rebuilt into two new cabins using additional timbers. The museum here now has a Jack London cabin as does the city of Oakland.

Next to the cabin is a small visitors center where they have walls filled with photos of Jack London’s life, with emphasis on his time in the Klondike. A lovely lady who was hosting the visitors center gave a 30-minute talk about Jack’s time here in the Klondike. She has been a resident here for 44 years and has a love for Jack’s books. It was a very interesting museum.

There was the good and the bad about being in isolation or quarantine in a small town like Dawson City. The good news is that we were in a hotel owned by Holland America and they had on staff both a nurse and a paramedic. The bad news is that a small town does not have many flights out of town and it can be difficult to get home after being quarantined.

We also had three meals delivered to our rooms every day. The meals were all edible although not always warm. Breakfast could range from French toast to an egg and ham sandwich on an English muffin. Lunches were sandwiches, chicken, pasta and more. There was a lot of variety for dinner from steak to chicken and pork to pasta. The food was very edible and usually more than we could eat.

If we had gotten caught in a large city like Vancouver we would have had to rely on ordering room service or from a delivery app to eat.

I was tested again for Covid on day three and tested negative again. During our quarantine the US lifted its requirement to have a negative Covid test before entering the country. Therefore, I’m not really certain if I had Covid as well, or not.

On the evening of June13^th we were allowed out of quarantine and permitted to resume our normal activities. We went for a walk around town and the air somehow seemed fresher and the flowers more beautiful than before. We were able to secure flight arrangements to travel from Dawson City to Whitehorse and then on to Vancouver on Thursday June 16^th.

On this day we ventured out to the Parks Canada visitor center where we took a walking tour of the town’s historic sites as well as a tour of the sternwheel paddle wheeler called the Keno and a tour of the Palace Grande Theatre. The weather was cool and cloudy on and off but we managed to avoid any rain.

The tour of the downtown area was given by a woman named Faye who had lived in the town and area since 1976. She was extremely knowledgeable about everything around the city including some of the characters who lived there past and present. The Parks Canada similar to our National Parks organization owns 33 buildings in the town and has restored or is hopeful to restore them in the future. We were able to go inside a historic bank building, a historic post office building and a historic hotel. They had all been beautifully restored and appointed to reflect the goldrush times.

We may have had some delicious ice cream for lunch along the waterfront at the Klondyke Cream and Candy shop. They serve up 32 flavors of ice cream, soft serve, waffle cones and more.

After our lunch we toured the paddle wheeler Keno that is now being preserved in dry dock on Front Street at the river’s edge. The vessel was launched in 1922 and is celebrating its 100^th year this year. She transported silver, zinc and lead ore down the Stewart River from mines in the Mayo district to the confluence of the Yukon and Stewart Rivers until the years after World War II. It was retired from service in 1951 due to the extension of the Klondike Highway. The Keno has been a tourist attraction in Dawson City since 1960.

Onboard the vessel we were able to see where the steam was created by burning extensive amounts of wood to turn the large paddle wheel at the rear. They would be making stops along the voyage to pick up more and more wood as its hull was not large enough to carry the ore and enough wood to get it to its destination. The upper level carried some passengers in a dozen or so very small cabins, each equipped with bunk beds and a ceramic basin. There was a fairly large kitchen to feed not only the passengers but also the crew. They continue to maintain the vessel and it is in excellent looking condition.

The Palace Grand Theatre is a fully restored, gold rush era theater originally built by Arizona Charlie. Most of the building was in such poor condition at restoration that little of the original structure exists today. The theater has a large lobby with a dance floor and seating on the first floor, two upper floors with box seats and some dressing rooms and apartment for the owner. In its heyday miners would attend shows and then dance the night away with percentage girls who received a quarter on every dollar they got for a dance. Miners also would spend large amounts of money on drinks. Percentage girls made as much as $750 a night. That was a lot of money at that time. The theater is still used extensively today for community theater groups, comedy events, civic events and fundraisers.

After returning to our hotel Kent was still feeling like he had a cold and was feeling tired. I suggested that we use a Covid rapid test to see if it was a cold or something else. Unfortunately, the test came back positive so I decided to take one as well. My test came back negative. We contacted the program manager and a nurse was immediately sent to our room to test us again. Her tests showed the same results that ours did. She informed us that the Yukon requires a 7-day isolation period, plus another three days after isolation before you are permitted to travel. The nurse suggested that we isolate separately in hopes that I would remain negative. If we were to stay together and I tested positive later, the clock would start all over again for my isolation.

I was promptly taken to another building for isolation where nearly every room was filled with people who were also in isolation.