I've read Recent Messages all the way up to May 24, so I'm going to stop and take time to report that I am baaaaaaaaack from the great white north.

Instead of making one long, drawn-out, boring trip report, I may just report little snips as they occur to me.

We flew to Vancouver, BC, the land of that wonderful Canadian Dollar, and then boarded the "Summit" a panamax ship of mind boggling size and sailed up the inside passage stopping at interesting places in southeast Alaska.

I'll mention one highlight now and others will come out later.

We took a ride on the WPYL, or something like that. I think it stands for White Pass and Yukon Line. It's a narrow gauge railroad that goes from Skaguay over White Pass and into the Yukon Territory.

We only went as far as the Canadian border at White pass. In 20 miles we gained about 6000 feet, sometimes on grades about as steep as a train can manage. We crossed both wood and steel trestles and went through two tunnels. Sometimes the track, which was first laid over 100 years ago, was hanging on the edge of a cliff. I was not very comfortable when everybody got up and went to that side of the train. I know that "narrow gauge" rails are only three feet apart instead of the normal 48.5 inches, and I had to wonder why the whole thing didn't tilt off that 2000 foot drop into the canyon.

I would not even think of taking that trip again, but I wouldn't take anything for having done it once. Even the disembodied voice on the PA system admitted that it was a rare day when you could see mountains and the ocean many miles away. The blue-tinted glacier above the pass was normally hidden in the clouds, but we saw it gleaming in the sun. At the pass, we saw deep snow drifts and icy waterfalls.

Twice, there was a bear on the tracks. Both times, they were smart enough to step aside and wait for the train to pass, but the disembodied voice was facing backwards and called our attention to the wrong side of the train. I missed them both, but a few people saw them. (They were the same kind of bears that we see in the Smokies all the time.)

The train was made up of "restored vintage and reproduction" cars and the engines were vintage diesel. Sometimes antique steam locomotives do the pulling. I'm never sure where to draw the line between vintage and antique.

I think the cost of the ride was something like $2.50 cents a mile. Worth it.

White pass was part of the route taken by countless gold miners during the Alaskan gold rush days.
Howard