the Yukon

This was our honeymoon. We flew into Whitehorse, rented a car, and drove up to Dawson and the Tombstones, dipping into Alaska along the way and then looping back down to Whitehorse. It was the very end of August. We camped here and there along the way and stayed in the occasional motel. Warm days, cold nights, very few bugs. We were in Whitehorse once before on a tour for a play, long before we were together, and that was in 40 below winter-time. I thought it was so beautiful then. The dry crystalline snow, the huge shaggy ravens - all seen through frozen eyelashes. And Jay has a special love for the Yukon, having spent a few years living here. So it was just the right place to go. It's a place of astounding beauty and vastness - it's hard to grasp, even in person.

First night camping. Sky beginning to clear.

Early morning lake - very cold. Joyfully rush in, submerge, race back out.

Empty roads. Nothing but trees, mountains, lichen, unseen animals.

At 6 random times a day, Jay's alarm would go off, and he would stop whatever he was doing and draw. This often happened when we were driving. I would get out of the car and take pictures or just stand and look. So silent, everywhere. So much bush. So much sky. Nothing but a road to represent a human presence. Where else could you find yourself so deep in an untouched world? Mountains never thought about, lakes never looked upon - all part of a big something, like ocean or air, too big to try to wrap our minds around. Too big to divide up, to be bothered with. For 8 months of the year it's covered in snow and saves itself from being popular, from attracting people and business. Saves itself from change. It exists for itself only - that's how it feels when you're there, witnessing briefly what usually goes unwitnessed. You feel very small, very humble. Because at home all the nature we have is familiar and seems owned by us and maybe even dependent on us. And up there, you realize what a joke that is.

 

A vast expanse that was eaten up by fire years ago. You can drive a long time and see only this kind of terrain. Wiped out forests starting up again. Charred and spindly trunks waiting patiently to be overtaken by new growth.

The 'top-of-the-world' highway just past the border crossing back into Canada. I don't remember which of the above pictures were from Alaska. As we drove through a few tiny towns (Chicken, Alaska included) we passed lots of hunters hauling out caribou. Some were butchering them up at the side of the road. Some passed us in trucks adorned with gory racks of antlers. I hope they were planning to live off that meat. It was hard to see - and didn't fit my sense of this place being larger and more powerful than man. As though trees should be reaching out, dragging hunters back into the dark woods for vengeance.

Silent up here except for the whipping wind. It really does feel like the top of the world, with everything spread out below and before you. We spent a long time running up and down the slopes. Then Jay drew and I looked at lichen.

Now in Dawson. Old and weather-beaten. I can't imagine the winters here - they must drag the buildings into the ground. The town has this feeling to it of history that hasn't been paved over or encased in quaint museums. There are boardwalks out of necessity, not for cuteness. There are still goldminers. The city gives a prize every year to the best woodpile. People stick together to get through the winters and you can feel that here - the sense of community that doesn't exist in big, busy cities. Lots of beautifully cared-for homes. And lots of old houses still standing, in defiance of reason.

There is a certain romance to these crooked and falling-down buildings. Maybe a bear in the living room, a few marmots in the basement. Roots of trees patiently creeping into the walls, under floorboard, slowly taking over. Or maybe just a person living there, liking it that way.

Another hour or two North of Dawson is the Tombstone National Park. Full of roaming grizzlies, though we never saw any. It was cold up here. Autumn was in full-stride, just a couple days into September.

We came home, clothes full of wood smoke and dirt. Jay cried, as he always does when he leaves the Yukon. I want to come back too. Maybe even try living up here for a while one day.