Move over Dudley Do-Right!
We are standing in the famous Yukon Territory! ( Not really. Its actually British Columbia but don’t tell the tourists) There be gold in them thar hills! Or so the stampeeders believed but once they reached Lake Bennett with all of their supplies they had to wait for the snow to melt. Then they built rafts and waited for the Yukon River to melt. Once spring came, they sailed down the rapids into gold territory.
According to the exhibits located at the visitor Center , miners put boats in the Tutshi River near the canyon where the suspension bridge is today. Looking at the rapids as they swirled down under the bridge and beyond its hard to believe they could take fully loaded boats and survive. Many didn’t survive and many other lost everything except their lives.
Tutshi River and Canyon today is one of the top white water rafting spots of North America.
It was cold here. The wind was blowing. This is the start of spring in the north and it was cold. I’d tried to imagine how cold it must have been when the miners dragged their supplies here to wait for the spring thaw.
But enough exploring the exhibits. It was time to cross the suspension bridge. That was what we came here for. No chickening out.
This was a pretty sturdy bridge as suspension bridges go but when you got to the middle you were at the mercy of the wind that gained momentum as it raced down the canyon from the icy tops of the surrounding mountains.
On the far side of the bridge was a platform and at the rear of the platform a wooden boardwalk that led to a tiny cabin. Just the basic 4 walls,a stove for heat, a bed frame and a tub for washing if you dared; this tiny cabin illustrated the conditions the stampeeders experienced as they waited for spring.
Chilled to the bone we returned across the suspension bridge to the visitor center to warm up and explore the souvenirs. The hot chocolate was pretty good too.
This was where we had out passports stamped with the Yukon Suspension Bridge stamp.
