Road to Carmack

On my bucket list for this trip was a chance to pan for gold in the Yukon. Dawson City has two places a greenhorn like me can try his luck. Claim #33 is a commercial claim that will teach you how to pan and gold is guaranteed. Sure enough. At the bottom of my pan were five small flakes of gold worth maybe four dollars. This is like my slot machine adventures. I traded fifteen dollars of cash for four dollars of gold!

The second part of the adventure was a trip up the road to Claim #6, a public spot on Bonanza Creek. Here you can pan for wild gold. With shovel and pan in hand, I tried my luck for an hour or so. It was a lot easier to find gold at the first stop. I found nothing in my pan. I froze my feet in the creek water and came away with a sore back but the fun of trying it was worth the effort. Charlie played in the creek and chased his Frisbee. It was time well spent. 

When the crowd of other tourist arrived we headed out for our drive toward Whitehorse. We had decided to make this a two-day drive so after four hours we found a nice Provincial campground near Carmack on the Klondike Highway. The price is cheap at $10.00 and since I didn’t hit the bonanza in the creek, that’s about what we can afford. The bugs are starting to appear so spending time outside requires bug spray to be comfortable. The campground is small and quiet so sleep will come easy tonight.    

Panning on Bonanza Creek