The Last Frontier: Dawson City

The next stop on our trip was Dawson City, Yukon. Dawson City was founded in 1896 during the Klondike Gold Rush. Dawson City is a small town with historic looking buildings. The roads are made of dirt and the sidewalks are made of wood. The buildings of the town are starting to sink into the ground due to permafrost thawing. Dawson City offers many tourist attractions such as Berton House, Claim #6, Danoja Zho Cultural Center, Dawson City Museum, Diamond Tooth Gertie's, Jack London Interpretive Museum, Klondike Institute of Arts and Culture, and Tombstone Territorial Park. For more information about the town and attractions visit http://www.dawsoncity.ca/.

Dawson City is my favorite town in the Yukon because it is so unique. I have never seen a city with dirt roads and wooden sidewalks. During our stay, we went to Diamond Tooth Gertie's which is a casino/bar. The casino has a stage where singers and can can girls perform. The show made me want to move to Dawson City and become a can can girl. After we saw a show at Diamond Tooth Gertie's, we walked across the street to a local place called the Downtown Hotel and Red Onion Saloon. The Downtown Hotel's bar is home of the famous Sourtoe Cocktail. If you do not know what a Sourtoe Cocktail is, here is the explanation from the sour toe club website:

"Established in 1973, the Sourtoe Cocktail has become a Dawson City tradition. The original rules were that the toe must be placed in a beer glass full of champagne, and that the toe must touch the drinker's lips during the consumtion of the alcohol before he or she can claim to be a true Sourtoer. The rules have changed in the past twenty-seven years. The Sourtoe can be had with any drink now (even ones that aren't alcoholic), but one rule remains the same. The drinker's lips must touch the toe. ' You can drink it fast, you can drink it slow-- But the lips have gotta touch the toe'" (http://www.sourtoecocktailclub.com/sourtoe.html).

The toes used in the Sourtoe Cocktail are actual human toes that have been dehydrated. I was told the idea for the cocktail came from the gold mining days. People turned in dead bodies of sourdoughs or gold miners in exchange for money. It was soon discovered that the same bodies were being turned in more than once. To solve this problem, the big toes were cut off the bodies. It is said that the toes used in the Sourtoe Cocktail are toes of the sourdoughs. I am a proud member of the Sourtoe Cocktail Club.

The next day in Dawson City, we took a rafting tour on the Klondike River. On the river, we went over some gentle rapids. We saw many local birds, beaver dams, and Bald Eagles. This was the first time I have ever seen a wild Bald Eagle. I watched as they flew above us and landed in trees. They are truly magnificent animals. At the end of our tour, the tour guides took us to a spot were the Klondike River meets with the Yukon River. In this spot you can see the two rivers because they are two different colors; the Klondike is blue and the Yukon is grey. The Yukon is grey because it has sediment in it. If you put your ear next to the Yukon River, you can hear the sediment falling. It sounds like sand falling between fingers. The next day, we would travel back to Alaska.