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20050622 Mayo YT 40/75 Cloudy & cool, then partly cloudy and warmer. Picture Link
We're at 63.6N, 135.9W in Mayo, Yukon. That's about the same latitude as Reykyavik, Iceland.
Mayo is on YT-11, which runs up the Stewart and Mayo Rivers to Keno, Yukon, branching off the Klondike Highway (YT-2) at Stewart Crossing. The road's more picturesque name is the Silver Trail. Somewhat after the Dawson/Klondike gold strike, gold and later silver were discovered here. Large-scale mining kept going here until the 50's and may start up again with high metals prices.
We got up, saddled up the rig, and headed north as number five in a herd of six RV's going up the Klondike Highway. The numbers and positions changed as rigs dropped out or joined in, but there were always a few in the clump.
We stopped to take a few pictures of the Yukon River. Then, at Stewart Crossing, we refueled and turned northeast for Mayo. This road is paved to Mayo (pop 350). We stopped at the Bedrock Motel and RV Park, and settled the trailer in there.
We grabbed a quick bite, and got onto the road for Keno, farther to the northeast. This part of the road is all gravel. It rained a little, in showers and drops, so the dust stuck to the truck. Truck now looks like a moving mudbank.
We went first to the museum in Keno. The resident dog (a shepherd) was lying there with a "pet me" look on its face. So I did, and scratched its ears and made a friend. We wandered through the little village's four museum buildings and said "wow" and took pictures and did all the touristy things.
The next stop was the top of Keno Hill, where the initial discovery here was made. It's 11km from the museum on a not-too-good gravel road. The vertical distance is 1,000 meters above Keno, at 6,047 feet. There was a right brisk breeze at the top, where there is a monument to the discoverer and a signpost showing miles to various cities around the world. There's also the framehead of a mine caving into itself nearby and lots of other markers where portals were at one time. Dolores took many pictures, calling the mountaintop an "alpine meadow" of flowers some of which she'd never seen.
A Yukon family was up there so that mom and a bunch of kids could bicycle down the road. Tough folks, these. Most American parents wouldn't take their kid up here, let alone put him/her on a bike and head downhill. We overtook them a couple of km down the road at a bend where they'd pulled out to take a break, then we went on into Keno.
If I have it straight, they took 220,000,000 ounces of silver out of this area. In the early days, it was freighted by horse teams, then caterpillar tractors, and multiple wagons to Mayo Landing, where it would be stored until spring. In the spring, the steamboats would move it to Whitehorse where the railroad would take it to Skagway for shipping to the refinery in Washington. Later a road to Whitehorse was built.
We finally returned to Mayo using the Duncan Creek Road (very rustic) and spotted five arctic hares along it. They have huge feet and would be white in winter. Now, they're a dark grey with white feet.
Back at Mayo, we ate in a Western/Chinese restaurant that rather eludes description. My Chinese dinner was good and Dolores's Fried Pork Chops were good as well. They were doing a good business.
Back to the trailer, then, and showers and work the pictures into the computer and so forth.
Tomorrow, we'll run toward Dawson City, put the trailer in the campground at the place at the Dempster Highway turnoff, and gather info to see if we use it to start the run to Inuvik Friday.
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