At present, I’m sat in a Yurt in Washington state. The rain is tip-tapping on the roof and there’s the gentle hum of the fan-assisted wood stove. Etienne is doing the washing up, I’ve been excused from helping as “The blog is more important.” (His words, not mine.) I’m trying to cast my mind back to the Yukon, but it’s a little tough – I guess I’m getting closer to mastering this ‘living in the moment’ lark. I’ll give it a go anyway…
The day after Miles Canyon we got up early*, had breakfast & headed out for a hike at Fish Lake. This was somewhere that the “Whitehorse-is-a-real-city-y’know” girl had recommended to us & that we’d also seen in all those brochures/mags I keep mentioning.
When we got there, we were mistaken for ‘someone-else’ which resulted in a nice chat with a local man. He pointed out some people ice fishing and told us the ice was about 3ft thick; deffo safe to walk on. So we went to chat to the ice fishers. Turns out it was 2 tourists just finishing up their ‘ice-fishing experience’. We’d been contemplating doing this; the tours were up to C$200pp though so we were hesitant. The girls didn’t really sell it… they’d caught nothing, the guide had drilled the (small) hole himself & they didn’t get to cook anything. They seemed happy-ish, but for C$400 we’d be looking for more than ‘ish’, thankyou-very-much.
So, off we went to find our hike. AllTrails showed the start about 0.6km up the road. We weren’t sure if we could drive it, so found some more locals** to ask; they confirmed it’d be fine, so we drove on up & parked by the trailhead. There was a teeny-tiny disagreement on Etienne’s parking, but after he moved the car circa 0.5 inches further forward, I was happy & we set off.
We had the absolute best time. The trail started well packed & winding slowly through the trees. Eventually the trees broke & we traversed our way across a barren snow plateau type thing, before reaching a ridge. We followed the ridge up to our first mini-summit. I balanced a rock on top of another rock and we commented on our continued disbelief of how not-flat the Yukon was.
After this mini-summit, we consulted our eyes & our AllTrails route and settled on a crest in the distance as our next goal. It started off easy enough, but, about 10 minutes in, our nice packed trail disappeared. We were determined to make it though, so continued on. The snow was tricksy; sometimes it would hold firm, but with the next step you’d be knee-deep in powder. We tried a number of methods to prevent ourselves from sinking into the snow, with varying levels of success.
After lots of clambering, falling, re-clambering & laughing we eventually made it to the top and ohhh it was SO rewarding! Definitely one of the most challenging hikes we’d done & the view was incredible. We were a bit conscious of time & of a big grey cloud in the distance, so we took a few quick snaps, then sheltered behind a rock for a short lunch (leftover cheese & charcuterie).
We then headed back down – lots of walking, a bit of butt sliding & a heck load more laughter.
When we got back, we were absolutely pooped. We had dinner & had planned on an early night… but the sun had other plans. At around 10:30pm Lene shouted down to us to see if we were awake. Her friend (Richard, a professional photographer) was out at Fish Lake waiting for the Northern Lights. There was high solar activity with an 8+ KP Index!!! (We don’t entirely know what that means, but it sounded exciting.)
We deliberated on going out, then around 11pm Richard called back. The line was muffled, the signal was bad, but eventually we heard the words: “The show is on.”
We leapt to action; wrapping up warm & grabbing the final banana muffins. We followed Lene & Mojo (her dog) back out to Fish Lake. When we got there, the sky was dark. We stood with Richard & Lene for a good few hours, chatting, chomping muffins & sipping the tea Lene had wisely packed. We looked at the dark sky & the few faint lines which were left, telling ourselves & each other: “It’ll be back”.
We gave up around 2am – seems we had missed the show. Richard showed us some pics of what we had missed & we bought a calendar*** from him for the memory of a great night. We may not have seen the lights in all their glory, but chatting & sharing this moment with them was once-in-a-lifetime in it’s own way.
*I thought it was early, but I’ve now remembered later in the day we were commenting on how grateful we were for longer days as we started the hike around 1pm – clearly not an early start. (Back to top)
**The amount of people we spoke to, may mislead you into thinking that we were somewhere with people. In fact, it was super quiet. We just happened to speak to every single person that was also in the spot at that time, all of whom were either coming or going. If you were hop on a jet & fly there right now, chances are you’d see no-one. (Back to top)
***We’re travelling for most of 2023 so the calendar won’t get much use this year. We’ve researched though 2034, 2040, 2045 & 2051 have the same day/date structure, so we can use it in these.
