Sunday, February 12, 2006

Whitehorse to Skagway to Haines, Alaska

This posting is about packing amazingly diverse scenes and scenarios into a 24 hour period. The trip from Whitehorse, Yukon into Alaska to the Pacific coast towns of Skagway and Haines is normally a trip with breathtaking sights, however, this trip exceeded expectations. The trip itself could be done in 7 hours--inculding a one-hour ferry trip between Skagway and Haines.






Leaving the office at 6:00 pm on Friday to finish off work, I left with Kells Boland, a consultant from Calgary who is about halfway through a one-year contract here in Whitehorse. Although we started out late in the day, we had a full moon to shed light on the snow-covered mountains along the 180 km leg of the South Klondike Highway to Skagway . On top of White Pass, the moonlight created an especially bright glow on the extra white and picturesque mountain peaks. The snow was packed two metres high on the sides of the road.

As the road descended down to Skagway, Kells and I watched in awe as a meteorite shot across the sky turning from red to brilliant green. It is easy for the imagination to get carried away in such an event, however, since we were in a fairly narrow valley and we watched it fall below the high mountain peaks, I don't believe it could have been more that 40 km away. Having seen many shooting stars, this was something completely different and "out of this world."

In Skagway, we grabbed a pizza and then headed onto a late-evening ferry that took us up through fjord-like narrows to Haines. Haines is prized as one of the more beautiful places in Alaska with a dramatic mountainous backdrop to a small town with a big character. In the evening, Kells and I played pool and uncovered some of the "character" of Haines as we were trounced one game after another.

Below are pictures in and around Haines taken on the second day of our trip. The first picture is of the mountains and ocean in front (West) of Haines taken from the balcony of our motel.

One block north of the motel is "downtown." Now for some shots of downtown... The first is of the "Bamboo" that has a colourful history (in the northern sense of what "colourful" means...aka poker, prostitutes and pints of beer). Great fish & chips and the place we lost more than a few games of pool.


About one kilometre from the "downtown" Haines is Fort Seward. What is bizarre about Fort Seward are the large frame houses on the perimetre of what was once a US military fort. Pictured below are the officers quarters that are, I am told, unlike anything this far north. A brief history of the Fort goes like this (from: http://hotelhalsingland.com/history.html)...

TheKlondike Gold Rush was winding down but Southeast Alaska's frontier was still wild and wide open in 1901. That year the continuing United States-Canadian border dispute prompted the U.S. government to establish a military presence at the missionary settlement of Haines. Construction began in 1903 on the fort that would be named in honor of William H. Seward, the Secretary of State who arranged the purchase of Alaska from Russia. In World Wars I and II, the Fort was a training base for Alaska recruits. At the end of World War II it was decommissioned and declared surplus property. What kept the fort from a five World War II veterans and their families who had a dream. They bought the surplus 85 buildings and 400 acres sight unseen. Not sure how well they maintained the buildings after that, however, at present, things are getting a wee bit shoddy.




Around Haines...

If you are curious about Haines...go to:
http://haines.ak.us/