June 5 - Skagway, Gold Rush Town!

We got up and headed to breakfast this morning as usual. Most of the morning we diddled around the ship since riding on the White Pass Train was our only plan for the day, and we had booked an afternoon trip. 

We had lunch on the early side then headed out. We were docked but had to take a small boat to get onto land because of the potential for a landslide where we would normally disembark. The boat trip only lasted four minutes but the whole process took 25-30 minutes since you had to wait for a boat, get loaded, wait for it to get full before being able to leave. It was quite windy this day, so there were even more challenging conditions to get the tender boats docked and load/unload everyone safely.

Once we landed, we headed into town with about an hour to kill before our train ride. We picked up our train tickets and walked down main street. We had already explored the visitors' center that detailed the saga of the gold rushers, so we were looking for other things to explore. Fortunately, the National Park Service has continued to develop historic sites that show various aspects of what Skagway was like when the gold rush happened. We found a National Park site which was one of the original bars in Skagway. It was fascinating to see how it would have been set up in those days, including the kinds of gambling that would have gone on at that time.

We then found the "cribs" or brothel houses that women operated out of back in the day. They were very small and basic - not at all like the glitzy whorehouses that are portrayed in movies. That led us to The Moore House, one of the original homes in Skagway - also very interesting. 

We headed back to the train station and waited to board. The train guy took us on a short walk where we boarded our cars. It was nice to see our cars were only about half full so there was plenty of room to stretch out and move around as needed. 

The train ride was very enjoyable but without any true highlights (Leon's opinion). We crossed over a few bridges and tunnels, had cool views of the train, river, and surrounding mountains. We could also see a portion of the original Chilkoot trail taken by gold rush folks headed to Dawson. We were worried the train would be cold, but it was enclosed and heated. We briefly went into Canada, turned around, and headed back.

The entire town of Skagway is considered a national historic site because it is the only town of its era that never burned. Kinsees Curios has been in continuous operation in that same building since it opened in the late 1800's.

We rode the train in one of their "vintage" cars. The seats were definitely meant for 19th century sized people, with low backs and narrow seats. Leon and I didn't mind squeezing in together.

We crossed the river a number of times as we climbed - and the views got more and more impressive. The water here looks murky because it is glacier-fed, meaning there is a good deal of sentiment in it that the glacier has ground up on its way down the mountain.

At one point, we could look back and see the Skagway harbor as we climbed into the mountains.

This was a narrow-gauge railroad. A few times there were tracks running beside each other, so we passed trains running in the opposite direction.

As we reach the summit of our journey, there was snow still all around, and the lake was still quite frozen (but thawing).

We disembarked the train and hot footed it to the tender so we would beat the crowd. We just managed to get ahead of a massive influx of our shipmates and were able to get on the next tender. If we hadn't managed to get ahead of that crowd, we would have been stuck in line on the dock for probably close to an hour, and it was getting windier and colder! That said, we were stuck on the dock an extra 15 minutes as the high seas made it difficult to load and unload the tenders.

We made it back to the ship, had a snack in the Lido, and headed back to the room. We changed and did a spa cycle. Leon was starting to feel a little off in the spa, and by the time we got to dinner we could tell he wasn't right. He ate 10% of his food and was ready for bed as soon as we got back in the room. 

I stayed up until midnight or so and there was still light when I went to bed. As the ship left Skagway, I was able to get a better view of the mountains that surround the area; the light was just right, so I snapped a few pictures.