Conscious Choice: Midnight Sun

August 2008 | Escape the Pace

Midnight Sun

Afloat in the Yukon

By Crai S. Bower

The Yukon was straining to break loose the ice that bound it down. It ate away from beneath; the sun ate from above.
— Jack London, Call of the Wild

The Yukon is all about light. The gloaming summer’s eve casts grey gauze over the region, inviting a visitor to dig deep into a midnight read without so much as a penlight to illuminate the miniscule print. The guest of honor itself reappears just after 4 a.m. to commence a relaxed sojourn across the vast Klondike sky. The prospectors likely made the three-year trek from Seattle to Dawson City blind with visions of a gold-laden bonanza, but for the contemporary Northwest traveler, the sun’s 24-hour radiance dictates a trip “North of 60” (degrees latitude).

Wandering the streets of Whitehorse, the Yukon’s largest town (and home to two-thirds of the 30,000 people in the 300,000-mile territory), I never really get over the light. The experience is just as I had hoped, a psychoactive rush without any ingested pollutants. I skip along at midnight, take to a terrace at 1 a.m. and go for a walk along the river trail just after 2 a.m. I blather incessantly: “I’m in the Yukon” as if I’ve notched the North Pole or circumnavigated the globe.

Why am I astounded to be standing on a forgotten pier, where once the steamers loaded passengers before heading up the Yukon River en route to gleaming Dawson City, with its opera houses and bordellos? Call it the Jack London effect. The Oakland, California, native mined more gold from the Klondike than most prospectors. He found a catalogue of characters, desperate for instant wealth in constant conflict with literature’s greatest antagonist: nature. His employ of this formula in monthly serials mesmerized America for 20 years; the misadventures of the ambitious still serve as fodder for childhood imaginations.

As a kid, I devoured Jack London like a sled dog his supper. The imminent, if terrifying, appearance of wolf, blizzard or both would lure me into the Yukon’s frostbitten prose on a perfect summer’s day. Sure, Buck is saved by the spring thaw, but London ignored the Yukon summer because his readers already understood summer. But oh, what a season to behold when bear, human and sun come out to play 24 hours a day.

One must take to the water here. I arrive in Whitehorse and within the hour, I’m canoeing Chadburn Lake under the vigilance of a black bear sow and her two cubs, who observe me from water’s edge before playing tag across the hillside. From touchdown to bear sighting in 60 minutes. I know it took the miners, who were required by Canadian customs to transport a year’s worth of food and supplies, two and half years to reach this point, yet I feel no guilt.

The next morning, peaks dart in and out of view as I kayak the winding, easy-paced Yukon River toward Lake LaBarge, one of several lakes that spread the river for a stretch of headwind-laden, arduous paddling. Cumulous clouds glower in the western sky; downpours form obtuse screens of rain. Lake LaBarge’s reputation as a suddenly swarthy body of water is well deserved (several stern-wheeler steamers once capsized here). This lake’s infamy often hampers the 400-mile River Quest Kayak and Canoe Race from Whitehorse to Dawson City, the longest competitive paddle of its kind in the world. If you paddle, add this excursion to your bucket list. I wouldn’t call myself a paddler, but I plan to take on the Yukon next summer. (The quest to impress Jack London never ceases.)
We paddle into the lake as the hour hits nine; the sun remains high up in the sky, hours from scratching the horizon or even a mountain peak. The waves are light, the breeze steady, an occasional whitecap approaches ominously.

“Stay near the shore and avoid the middle of the lake,” warned Scott McDougal, proprietor of Kanoe People in Whitehorse. “And if the wind kicks up, watch out.”

Naturally, as the wind increases, I have strayed toward the lake’s center. I steer my kayak shoreward, only to abandon the angle when the rising waves roll me out of my comfort zone. My knowledge of the Pythagorean theorem is admittedly hazy, but I know I must determine a hypotenuse at some point and follow the C toward the lodge.

I do eventually arrive ashore at the Great River Lodge, where a bountiful meal awaits. The other guests have arrived by tour boat and word quickly circulates that my companion and I have paddled our way to dinner. Having “roughed” it north on the Yukon, I bask in my role as pseudo–wilderness adventurer. Jack would be proud. If only I had made the passage during winter.

Crai S. Bower received a 2008 “Northern Lights Award for Excellence in Canadian Travel Journalism” this April. Check out the winning story: www.flowingstreamwriting.net

Recommend this page to a friend

Top Ten pages recommended to friends: