Whitehorse, YT - How to use Palmolive

One of the first things we did was to get our window patched. We didn’t want it to get any worse.

Then we went into town, walked along a marvelous path which lined the Yukon River.

We also toured the paddle wheeler, Klondike, they have as a reminder of the founding of Whitehorse. It was the largest sternwheeler on the upper Yukon River. Sternwheelers ere used on the Yukon in the late 1860’s on to supply the towns up river with goods and and to carry the ores back down to Skagway via trail from Whitehorse. It also carried passengers. The Klondike itself was built in 1929 and used as an ore hauler until it was holed and sank in 1936. It was rebuilt the following winter using the same superstructure and machinery salvaged from the wreck. It was relaunched and continued to carry passengers and goods until 1955 as the last sternwheeler in existance.

Inside the main deck of the ship are piles of goods that were needed upriver to last through the winter.

Lots of liquor and beer.

It also carried lots of empty ore bags that HOPEFULLY were going to be used to bring the ore back down the river.

The crew quarters were open for us to see.

But the passenter quarters of both first class and second class were not open since they had some questions about the stability of the upper deck. But here’s Nancy playing quoits on the upper deck.

During the 7 1/2 months of winter when the boats were not running the boat companies hired workers to go up and down the river cutting trees down, piling the wood so that the boats would have fuel to make it up the river in the summer. Here’s a deckhand loading the wood on to the ship. He may look small but he is nothing but a powerhouse. That wood is not light.

It is a stern wheeler - guess why. There are two rudders because the draft is so shallow that a large deep rudder could not be used.

When the bought the Klondike and had to move it through town to get it to the spot on the river where they wanted to display it, they had to tow it through town. What a sight that must have been. (Gary and I have seen a 3-story apartment house being towed through the streets of Des Moines and that was fun to watch.) Moving the Klondike took 12 people 3 weeks using 3 bulldozers. They also used 8 tons of Palmolive Princess soap flakes, slighly dampened, to help the process. Made the boat move more easily through the streets.

Fun visit and an educational way to learn about Whitehorse. But we’re not done.

 

We walked around town and saw this interesting home.

We visited the airport where they have the world’s largest weather vane. We were reading about it when we both heard a creak. We looked up and, sure enough, it was turning. It really IS a weather vane.

Nice campground here.

Tomorrow we move on.