THE SILVER TRAIL - Stewart Crossing to Keno Hill

          Today we ventured off the gold rush trail and followed the silver trail.  In the area of the Stewart River, in the early 1900  the gold prospectors were finding more and more galena in their pans.  Galena is a crystal with silver-lead.  The frequent occurrence caused some prospectors to search for the source an extremely rich silver vein at Galena creek.  Within 10 years,  600 claims were stacked and 2,500 tons of high silver ore was taken.  A modern silver mine operated till the late 1990 and was the backbone of the Yukon economy for 70 years.  The population of Keno City is now only 12.    It is clear they are trying to build a tourism based economy, with lots of lakes for fishing and recreational activities.  

Keno City Mining Museum

          We left the trailer at 5 Mile Territorial Campground (near Mayo) and drove the second half of the silver trail (gravel again) with just the truck.  At the Keno City sight, I decided I needed to buy a snack at the Nostalgic Keno Hill café, but unfortunately the proprietor had “gone fishing”. 

"Gone Fishing"

          We drove up the very washed out road to the top of Keno Hlll to the famous ( apparently) sign post. 
At 1800 metres high, the summit provided incredible panoramic views of McQuesten Valley and the Ogilvie and Wernecke Mountains.  Unfortunately I did not realize on that my camera lense was smudged and my pictures are not that great.  

Truck on summit

Old Silver Mine 

View from Keno Hill

          We had a fabulous evening at the campsite, sheltered by trees, but enough sun coming through we got to eat outside. 

Henry peeling stick on campsite

                                 
  Before leaving Dawson City in the morning we had gone to the farmers market and bought fresh locally grown produce so we had a spinach salad with sautéed beet green, campfire roasted potatoes and Henry’s homemade venison sausage.  

          After dinner we went for a walk along the lake, it was 10PM, the sun was shining bright, the children were swimming.  You would have thought it was 4 in the afternoon.