Chicken, Top of the World and Dawson City

I’m on the top of the world lookin’ down on creation And the only explanation I can find Is the love that I’ve found ever since you’ve been around Your love’s put me at the top of the world. . . by the Carpenters

We left Fairbanks heading for Chicken, Alaska. We planned to meet up with Judy and Mike at the campground before we cross the border back into Canada. It took much longer than we had anticipated as the road to Chicken was probably the worst road we have traveled so far. In addition we had no service for the longest time. Longer than I had thought we would. I honestly thought we would have service as soon as we arrived in Chicken. Joke was on me. Chicken is comprised of 12 residents–and I believe they all work at the 2 campgrounds there. Back in the day Chicken was a gold mining town–well actually they are still mining gold and the 2 campgrounds allow you to pan while you are there. Guess what we did?

We indeed met up with Judy and Mike–they are feeling much better–not 100% but much better. Dawson City is only about 100+ miles from Chicken but, the road is dirt and gravel so it was slow going. Our plan was to camp in Dawson City and prep our campers for the Dempster Highway. We received lots of good word that the Dempster was in good shape. The road to Dawson City is called The Top of the World Road and it is rightfully named. Would you believe the picture at the top is pretty much the picture I took at the Top of the World. Oh, and this one.

The Top of the World Highway on the US side was paved from Taylor Junction but I don’t remember how many miles that was. It was paved to the Canadian border and then it was dirt and gravel again. We had to wait for a ferry to get across the Yukon River to get to Dawson City. It’s free but we waited about 40 minutes while 2 ferries transferred others. Judy and Mike were right behind us and they actually made the same ferry as us. We checked in Bonanza Gold RV Park and John and Mike are sealing up windows and such. Tomorrow we will head out on the Dempster Hwy to Tuktoyaktuk where we will see the Arctic Ocean and I am hoping to be brave enough to take a dip. I know John will and I really want to but, it is cold water. On the bright side it is going to be somewhere in the 80’s. We can only get the weather as far as Inuvik which is still 144km or 90 miles from Tuktoyaktuk. When we leave here we will lose our service. I will lose my wordl streak. I better see a lot of wildlife.