"Wrapping up Whitehorse"

18 Jun 2015--On Tuesday we drove over to Miles Canyon, a nice place in Whitehorse that has lots of walking/hiking trails.  The water here isn't quite as beautiful as Crystal Lake that we saw on Monday, but it is still a very pretty blue.  Here we are at an overlook looking down to where we will ultimately go ourselves for a hike.



Here's Cathy heading for, and over, the bridge and into the woods.



Some shots along the way.  We think we walked about 3 miles,  mostly along the river's edge, but some a tad deeper in the woods.



We have been surprised at how few plants and birds we have seen over the past couple weeks.  You see a lot of these blue flowers along the highways, but that is really about the extent of it so far.  And aside from the occasional magpie, these are the only birds we have seen.  Don't know what they are, but they are small and were pretty sure these 2 were courting.  haha



On the last leg of our hike we noticed a few of these paw prints in the dirt...not sure, but it could have been a bear?  And if it was, it was fairly recently going this way.  We were "jiggling the keys" till we got back to the car.  haha



Yesterday was overcast with occasional rain, so we went down to the MacBride Museum to see what they had for us.



This wasn't part of the exhibit (haha), but I thought it was pretty cool.  This cottonwood tree looks almost like a regular tree until you look closer and see all the "cotton" hanging from it.  Blow up the 2nd picture...there is quite a bit of it.  It sheds, too...there was a lot of the cotton on the ground, which is what drew my attention in the first place.



This little museum had quite a bit of stuff in it.


A small exhibit had a lot of "First Nation" items, from the snow shoes to this Chief's hat with grizzly claws on it.  There are 14 bands, or tribes, of First Nations peoples here in the Yukon, and I think we read they make up something like 60% of the population.  They have their own governments, but I don't think they have Reservations like in America.  I will have to ask Gayle and Yvette about that when we see them again.



An interesting story about Kate.  She made this cape from squirrel fur after she was robbed of her fortune by her husband...there goes the white man again, holding everyone down!  haha



Haven't seen these in our travels before.



They had gobs of stuffed animals.  We read that there are about 70,000 moose in the Yukon alone, nearly double the human population.  We also read that they are rarely seen from the road, so I guess we have been really lucky to have seen 4 so far.  I also didn't know that like a cow, a moose has more that one stomach to help digest their food, and a male moose averages almost 1800 pounds full grown...wow!  The moose behind Cathy is real...an albino moose!  This one was killed in 1970 by a hunter, and to date is the only one killed in the Yukon.



Of all the animals we have seen road signs warning us about, the caribou has been the most elusive. Hope to see some before the trip is over.  They travel in groups, so that will be something to see.



And, of course, the bears!!!  That one standing behind me is not on a raised platform...so big!  And look at the claws on the one in the 1st pic!



Lots of old machinery and gadgets from the early settlement times.



And some fun stuff, too!  Notice that Cathy's disc is in the -10 point area, where my disc is smack in the middle!!!  haha  My prisoner escaped while I wasn't paying attention in the 2nd pic, and Cathy tried to call and report it in the 3rd pic, but like all phone service here, we were unsuccessful! wow...what a bad story!  haha



This is an old washing machine from 1912.  The clothes were put between the rubber "teeth" and mashed together to get the dirt out.  Hey, I'm sure it was a lot of work, but probably far better than beating the clothes against a rock in the cold!



Movies from the past.  We didn't recognize any of the stars names as these were made in Canada, but like old American movies, I am sure the "Indian" in the 2nd pic was really a white lady!  haha



So, there was a lot more to see in the Museum, but nothing compelling, so I spared you.  It's raining off and on again today, but we are good with the downtime.  Gotta do some cooking anyway, so it works out!  TTYL