Today, we docked in Skagway. (Who names these cities, by the way?)
No skags were in sight — or, if any were there, we couldn’t see ’em due to the thick, white fog that reduced visibility to a few feet in front of our faces. For the same reason, the first half of our “Ultimate Yukon and White Pass” tour was pretty much a loss. (We spent ninety minutes gazing out bus windows at ivory-colored blankness.)
Our driver, a witty, squeaky-clean recent graduate of Brigham Young University, comforted us by describing what we couldn’t see — and by reassuring us that, once across the border into Canada, the fog would lift.
He was right; it did. Unfortunately, when the fog lifted, the torrential rain began.
Occasional glimpses of the landscape were rewarding, though: stunted evergreens, towering firs, lichen-covered granite boulders, thundering waterfalls. These were the real attraction; the scheduled stop for lunch — at a tacky, touristy “mining camp” fabricated for the express purpose of serving lunch and selling trinkets to bus tours — was completely forgettable.
We liked our stop in Carcross much better, despite the fact that it was only thirty minutes long. There’s not much to Carcross except for the general store, but it was stocked with items we hadn’t seen anywhere else (including cola balls — candy spheres, painted silver, that taste like cola once the chrome shell melts away).
We also liked the narrow-gage train trip down from Summit back to Skagway. After a few minutes of blind travel, the fog finally lifted, treating us to dizzying views of plunging gorges and rain-swollen waterfalls.
Back in Skagway, we found great buys on hooded rain jackets (if only we’d shopped before departing this morning!) and stuffed animals for Chelsea. Skagway itself is pretty much one street — Broadway — lined with jewelry stores and t-shirt shops, but the recreated mining-era storefronts make shopping and strolling a pleasure.
Back on the ship, I dried out and wound down with a tall, cool Blue Coco Mojito: rum, fresh lime, crushed fresh mint and lots and lots of ice.
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