Whitehorse Regions Guide - excursions

Klondike
The area around Dawson City, which lured thousands of young men and a few brave women to join in the world's last great Gold Rush in 1897, is today bursting with attractions and sights centred on this romantic piece of Canadian history. Dawson City itself is a colourful town with boardwalk-lined streets and plenty of restored historic buildings, including Diamond Tooth Gertie's Dancehall and Casino. Then there is Carmacks, originally a riverboat fuelling station that is now a community preserving the First Nations culture, with an interpretive centre sketching aboriginal history over 10,000 years. Fort Selkirk is the oldest settlement in the area and now survives as a living museum. The other venue to visit on the Klondike trail is Pelly Crossing, where the life and times of the Northern Tutchone people is preserved at 'Big Jonathan's House'.

Kluane National Park
This vast park is dominated by mountains and ice in Canada's extreme alpine zone, and is a magnet to mountaineers and rugged adventure-seekers. The landscape includes mountain lakes, alpine meadows, tundra and swift cold rivers. At the heart of the park is Mount Logan, rising up in the midst of an ice field to 19,545ft (5,959m), the highest mountain in Canada. Local tour operators in Yukon towns offer a variety of memorable day trips and excursions into the Park, featuring a wide range of activities such as canoeing, nature walks, rafting, fishing, hiking and mountain-biking. Air flips over the area are also a very popular way to sightsee. The Kluane National Park Visitor Reception Centre is at Haines Junction near the Alaska Highway.