Young Man polishing a piece of Jade

Pieces of Jade found in the mountains near Jade City









Special Saws are used to cut the Jade, Jade is a very hard stone and not easy to cut.


We were surprised to see Steve & Lynnette Juntunen stopped at Jade City. We had met them in Skagway and had dinner together there and got to know each other.

We decided at that point to travel together to Deese Lake RV Park in Deese Lake B.C.
Motorhomes and tow cars were filthy from the rain and dusty roads. Steve tried hard to get most of his off and Dan ended up getting only one side clean.
Spent only one night and then headed to Stewart B.C.

Sept 2, 2007

We had a fun time in Atlin walking around the tiny town. Actually was driving up the roads hoping we would get a internet signal too but no such luck.
Being that it was Sunday some of the stores were closed. Community center was having a auction. Got hungry so we stopped at the little store that was open to get some snacks. I bought a bag of Yogurt covered raisins....Boy they were yummy!! Like chocolate covered raisins but was vanilla yogurt. Dan ate Cheeto's
It was a nice sunny day and we enjoyed the sunshine and watching float planes landing on the lake.
Headed back to the campsite and pack up for the next stop of our journey.

view of Atlin Lake

The MV Tarahn(Tah-ron )was built in 1916 by the White Pass & Yukon route, she carried passengers and freight from Atlin to Scotia Bay until 1936













This unusual house used to belong to someone who was into Holistic healing

Graves of Fritz Miller & Kenneth McLaren at the Atlin cemetery.
Fritz & Kenneth were the first to discover Gold in Atlin in July 1898

This is the grave site of Walter Gladstone Sweet, he was reputed to have been a card dealer in Soapy Smiths gang in Skagway and is buried in Atlin Yukon.

Sept 1st -2nd 2007

We camped two nights at at the Tagish Government Campground, Sept 2nd we took the Jeep over to the old town of Atlin.

This is a German RV parked behind us, we are seeing alot of German & Swiss people bringing over their own RV's to tour Alaska and most of them are only here for less than a month.

Our campsite at the Tagish Yukon Gov Campground. Cats were happy to get to go outside again. With Bears in alot of the areas we are careful about letting the cats out. A stray dog kept coming through our campsite so the sitting outside for the cats was short lived.
Met a nice couple from WhiteHorse camping. Enjoyed sitting around their campfire and chatting and enjoying their homemade wine.

Rainbow after it rained

Campground flooded in the front area next to the Tagish Lake. They had alot of rain and the lake overflowed .

Tagish Lake next to our campground

Sept 1st, 2007

As we left Skagway we passed many little lakes and beautiful scenery back into the Yukon . Colors are changing to Fall colors the Fireweed has lost it's pink blooms and now the stems are crimson red. I'd see tinges of copper colored trees.....aaaah I love Autumn!

New Blog Assistant

Well since I am so behind on my blog I have hired a new assistant. Do you think he qualifies? Maybe with Sasha Mio's help I'll get it caught up to date.

Skagway Alaska Aug 29th-31st

Here we are camped at the overflow area of the Pullen Creek RV Park. We had a perfect view of the Marina and all the cruise ships that came to Skagway. We also saw the thousands of people who came off the ships to go shopping and made a point to avoid the days where 4 ships were in and shop only on the day only 1 ship was there.

Met a really nice couple next to us , Steve & Lynette Juntunen who also had 3 cats! We did not know that they were behind us in Haines! We had dinner together and had a nice time.

We caught back up with them at Jade city and went to Stewart/Hyder with them and had even more fun!

We had fun checking out the historical part of Skagway, many buildings still stand from the 1800's.

Cruise ships docked and thousands of people head for the shops in Skagway. Dan and I avoided shopping on the days that had 4 ships in!

Beautiful gardens at the Skagway Inn

Historic Skagway Inn and beautiful gardens outside.

I was green with envy seeing these planter box's full of beautiful flowers and vegetables.....I miss gardening so much!!
Told Dan I WILL build some of these to put around our lot in Yuma.

Carved Moose Antlers, soap stone, in Skagway store

Totem pole in Museum in Skagway

Front view of the historic Mascot Saloon

Historic Mascot Saloon

Skagway Centennial Statue depicts a gold rush trail scene with a eager prospector being led by a Tlingit packer .

The Artic Brotherhood Hall

In 1899 Charley Walker nailed up 8,833 pieces of driftwood to the front of this building.

The Red Onion Saloon built in 1898 used to have a Brothel upstairs.

First cabin built in Skagway

The Days of 98 show with Soapy Smith

This play depicts the days of Soapy Smith's reign over the town of Skagway in the Klondike Gold Rush days of 1897-1898. Jefferson Randolph Smith was born in Georgia in 1861 and ventured West as a young man. He learned his trade of being a con man during the Silver & Gold rushes of Colorado and made his way to Skagway. His gang reigned supreme for 9 months. He tried to establish himself as a solid citizen of Skagway by doing some good deeds but then he robbed a Nanaimo British Columbia stampeder named J.D. Stewart of $2,800 in gold dust. He refused to give it back.
City surveyor Frank Reid saw through Soapy's "good deeds" in town and saw that Soapy and his gang had to get out of Skagway. He formed the Committee of 101 to get rid of Soapy Smith and it all came to a head on the wharf when Frank Reid shot Soapy Smith dead and Frank took a bullet too. Frank lived a agonising 12 days before dying. Only one person showed up for Soapy Smith's funeral and a woman all dressed in black was in the distance believed to be Belle Davenport. 2,000 people came to Frank Reid's funeral and Soapy's gang fled the town and ran for the hills. Most of them were arrested after Soapy's death though.

Jim Richards as Soapy Smith and Kristen DiBiase as Belle

Alison Long, Kristen DiBiase,Rori Nogee .....Wonderful Actress's in the "The Days of 98 Show with Soapy Smith"