By Ray Goodwin
Photos: Ray Goodwin
and Patrick McCormack
It was an email from Graham that got the ball rolling. I have paddled with Graham for years including expeditions on the Spey and as far afield as the Bloodvein. “Would you be interested in doing the Yukon?” An enthusiastic “Yep” was my response. This was one of the rivers on my tick list.
Ray Goodwin’s website: www.RayGoodwin.com
Ray’s YouTube Channel is: www.youtube.com/c/RayGoodwin
Canoe Patrick McCormack’s website: www.pureadventure.ie
Welsh Canoe Symposium
23-25th October 2019
Bala. www.raygoodwin.com/open-canoe-symposium
On February 13th, 2019, Ray was awarded the MBE for his services to canoeing, at Buckingham Palace. Here’s Ray pictured in his finest with family, Maya and Lina.
Ray Goodwin’s Big Salmon and Yukon
A plan started evolving and Graham suggest starting on the Big Salmon before joining the Yukon above Carmacks. Patrick McCormack from the Republic of Ireland joined us and soon after we had Elaine (Shooter) Alexander from Northern Ireland to complete the team. We were allowing eight days on the Big Salmon and down to Carmacks on the Yukon and a further eight down to Dawson.
We had a couple of days in Whitehorse to get ourselves sorted before the trip. For me it was unusual to be planning a multi-day trip with no portages but this meant a trip to the supermarket rather than the usual dehydrated stuff. We were to end up with four barrels of food to last us some sixteen days. At least we were only going to lug these from boat to camp and back again.
Up North Adventures were sorting the kit and shuttles for us and so with an early breakfast we were on our drive to Quiet Lake, which was a couple of hours on tarmac and then on to a gravel road for the last two. It was mid-afternoon before we could pack and launch determined to get a couple of hours in. Cloud was building as we paddled along a still lake. Camp spots were almost non-existent and so we grabbed a spot between the forest road and the lake. Having just set up we could hear thunder in the mid distance.
Quickly we got a tarp up to provide a shelter for cooking. Within minutes there were large waves topped in white rolling down the lake. Close inshore would have been uncomfortable but out in the middle… The squall had seemingly come out of nowhere. It is a recurrent warning out here that you should avoid the middle of large lakes and truthfully although I have paddled in far stronger winds and in even more violent squalls, I have seldom seen them come out of ‘nowhere’ like here. The morning saw us quickly on the way along the lake. We passed the end of the track and its campground and a couple of miles of fast flowing river dropped us into Sandy Lake.
A good camp spot was taken and we started settling into a routine. A gravity fed water filter was hung in the trees, tents set up and wood was collected with Graham splitting it down for easy use. Patrick, he should have been a chief, was busy organising the rest us for prep duties – a pattern was being set. Then last thing the barrels and all things attractive to bears were walked some distance from camp. All this hanging of stuff in trees becomes a bit academic when you are travelling through a forest dominated by black spruce, as there is a distinct lack of branches to throw ropes over.
Big Salmon Lake
Next day we had another section of river to take us down to Big Salmon Lake. It was here we had out first moose encounter as a mother and calf quickly trotted back into the trees. More was to come as we entered Big Salmon Lake, a mother and calf were swimming the wide mouth of the river. The mother occasionally getting a footing while the calf gamely swam along behind. We gave these two a very wide berth to avoid upsetting an already nervous mother.
Big Salmon Lake was over in few hours and we were in the river. It was relatively narrow, winding with a pebble bottom – the map and guide had fooled me. I normally associate meanders and oxbow lakes with slow moving lowland rivers, this was not the case here. The river was dropping fast and so we were speeding along. No rapids at all but a real need to manoeuvre quickly when necessary, where over hanging trees, log jams and strainers were normal. With this team it wasn’t a problem but it wasn’t to be underestimated. At one point was a cut through where the river had done a massive loop. Unfortunately, the cut through was blocked by a wide and precarious log jam, so we had a 15-minute paddle around the loop to progress just ten metres.
Campsites were plentiful and good and on those first days we were living off of fresh food. Patrick had even bought a small cool bag to keep cheese and ham longer.
the Chinook Salmon
Camps and river kept coming. The speed didn’t relent but things got wider so it was easy to avoid. We started spotting eagles now, occasionally flying but more often perched at the very top of a tree. The Big Salmon is aptly named as it is the spawning ground for the Chinook Salmon. These can grow up to 50 kilos in weight!
Alas we were too early in the season and had to content ourselves with pike and trout. I did reasonably well with the trout with a couple of really good-sized ones. At one of the camps I got one small one, which I returned and then a reasonable one, a good little appetizer for dinner. I gutted it and removed head and tail and then leaving it on the river bank walked back into camp to get my camera.
As I walked back onto the beach, I was just in time to see a bird fly off with it (I am sure it was a seagull), so at least someone got fed that night. The biggest catch of the trip was the Shooter’s pike, I reasoned that at least I had caught more.
As the days went on we travelled through this post glacial landscape with the river cutting through glacial till. At one point an Esker, a ridge line of glacial debris, paralleled the river. The guide book recommended a walk up onto it but we couldn’t spot a route through the dense forest. All the while there were high mountains, on both flanks that spoke of other adventures to be had.
It was only after the trip a friend pointed out that they had found the tiniest specks of gold in their water filters. It was something that had not occurred to us but this was a landscape that in the past had been dug, panned and dredged for gold. All traces of this had disappeared back into the forest.
The banks got higher and occasionally we saw heavily eroded sections of softer material. The resulting gullies, ridges and towers being known as hoodoos.
With a few bumper sections we sped our way down into the Yukon. In seven days we had not seen another soul but the Yukon was to be a culture shock.
The Yukon – an egalitarian river
We had gone from a narrow (ish) and intimate river into the broad expanses of one of world’s great rivers. A river steeped in the history of the first nations and of the gold rushes. It is still a working river with a small number of huge barges moving material to gold workings in side valleys. It is impressive to see the barges push upstream against the current much as the stern wheeled paddle steamers once did. Going downstream they travel at great speed. Now we were seeing other paddlers, so we were no longer having an exclusive experience and I for one found it unsettling. Remains of old equipment and dredges could be spotted occasionally but wildlife was now at a distance in the wide reaches.
A thin white band of material seemed to mark every bank now. It lay a metre or so below the surface. A little delving in the guide book sorted that one: it was from a huge volcanic eruption in 750 AD which blanketed the area. One thicker deposit was quite distinct and was known as Sam McGee’s Ashes from Robert Service’s poem, ‘The Cremation of Sam McGee,’
After a day or so we reached the ‘Coal Mine’ campground and yes, there was a coal mine here back in the days of the stern wheelers. Some was used for heating but a few of the steamers were converted to run on coal. Not a successful experiment as it was far easier to supply timber from the very many woodyard along the course of the river. The camp was welcoming with showers and a counter service for hot food.
Just before the campsite we had passed the, to us, the weirdest of wooden rafts, it had a railing all the way around, table and chairs as well as storage and a flat roof over it all. It too joined us at the campsite and that night the flat roof became a sleeping platform for the two old adventurers. They were heading all the way down the 1,000 miles to the Bering Sea.
This was a meeting point for many heading the 450 miles from Whitehorse to Dawson and our first sight of a few folk we would keep bumping into over the next days. We pitched up next to a fella that had canoed from Whitehorse and was finishing here: he regaled us with stories of his days as a float plane pilot and how now he was collecting his home/camper van and was on his way up to Alaska. The Yukon trip was just a bit of reminiscing for him.
Carmacks
We walked the three kilometres into Carmacks for a meal and to check out the shop there. It was blisteringly hot, so we decided to shop the next morning on our way past on the river. The store was good, if a little expensive being so far out, we could have easily stocked for the second half of the trip there. As it was, we added more fresh food.
The problem was now that we had too much time and so we had to instigate a lazier regime. No rush in the morning and after only five hours on the water we would start looking for the next camp. The river was rushing along at some 6-8 kilometres per hour.
No wonder so many novices travel this river. We kept meeting up with a German who was on his first ever canoe trip. He was solo in a 16-foot boat and knew only how to steer with the most basic of rudders. We met him again after Five Finger rapid and I asked him if had knelt for stability; he looked quizzically at me; he had never heard of kneeling in a canoe! My appreciation of this river was now changing, it was truly a river for everyone.
We four folk with massive experience between us and finding the whole thing technically easy and yet there were all these others having big personal adventures. There was a large extended family running it in sea kayaks, some with a depth of experience but there were novices in the party. Then the teacher from Ottawa that had bought a pack raft, tried it on his local river and then set off for 18 days on the Yukon solo. This was truly, a river for all.
Fiver Finger Rapid
A couple of days below Carmacks is the renowned Fiver Finger Rapid. Five channels separated by large blocky islands of conglomerate. This could have been the site of a river crossing for a proposed railway that was never to be built, with the islands acting as natural piers. Anyway, we followed all the advice and took the right-hand channel. It was easy enough at this water level and a very straight forward grade 1.
Patrick and I turned back into the eddies below and went for a little explore of the shoots – you can’t keep a good white water paddler down. The only interesting moment came when we hit an area of boils below the main channel. Instinctively and simultaneously we both went for a brace, which merited a momentary giggle. If anything, Rink Rapid, which followed immediately was bumpier on the day.
Looking through the excellent guide, it was amazing to see the pictures of stern wheelers making their way up this channel. There was even a cable so they could use a winch as assistance. Rocks and reefs had been blasted to make the channel safer, even so boats and lives had been lost.
We started settling back and chilling out. The days were easy, went fast and the scenery passed quickly. The only issue being smoke blowing up river from a fire just east of the river and others as far away as Alaska, meaning the air quality was poor. We were to hear afterwards that a complete fire ban had been put into effect throughout the Yukon.
However, we were unaware and continued to cook on very small wood fires. We were very cautious and were even dousing them immediately after cooking.
Fort Selkirk
Fort Selkirk is an impressive historical site on the banks of the river. First built in 1848 it only lasted four years before the local Chilkat people looted and burnt it down. They regarded the Hudson Bay Company as competition and that theirs was a long established trade monopoly between the coast and interior. It wasn’t until the 1880s that it was re-built. It’s an impressive set of wooden buildings and well worth spending time exploring – you can even camp there.
Whilst we were exploring a helicopter was shuttling firefighters in. All around lay kilometres of hose leading to sprinkler systems being set up on the top of every building. Window seals were covered with a layer of fine gravel to prevent blown sparks from catching wood aflame. The preservation of the site was being taken very seriously.
Partner swapping
Another day or so and we got back into cleaner air and we continued our swaps of paddling partners. A chance to chew the fat and explore the adventures of the others in the party. Graham, a construction engineer with his tales of big projects; Shooter and her solo sea kayak trip around Ireland; Patrick and his adventures by any form of paddle craft. Politics, life and anything else that took the fancy as well as long periods of silence and introspection. I think we talked more in the boat than we ever did in camp.
The White River joined us and added volume and a thick white sediment to the Yukon. From then on, we could only get water from side streams. Our one attempt at using the river water clogged the filters within minutes.
Out penultimate camp was on a low island/gravel/ sand bar – a pleasant enough spot. We had cooked and sorted and were walking the barrels out onto an exposed spit of sand. Thunder was beginning to rumble in the distance. Graham was out there when the wind struck again out of nowhere. We could barely see him through the sandstorm and he quickly retreated back to us.
final camp
The scenery remained big with a thick bed of basalt lining the eastern bank for some time. However, we eventually, slowed down and had a final camp. A delve through barrels for the last of the treats and an early start for breakfast in Dawson.
This was the site of the Klondike gold rush of the 1890s, where over 100,000 prospectors had rushed to the area.
The get out was alongside an old stern wheeler now high and dry as a museum. We were in no hurry. A chance for breakfast and a little explore.
