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Show es "They won't," I said, "because they won't come down this way. Just us-and the Chilkoots." We pulled our loaded sleds over small frozen lakes and down a twisting canyon nine miles to Lake Lindeman, the first mountain lake where navigation to the Yukon River would begin in the spring. Already on top of the snow, men were busily felling trees and hammering together boats for the last lap of the journey to Dawson City, five-hundred-miles distance. At Lake Lindeman we stopped to rest, then pressed on seven miles farther to Lake Bennett where Tip's supplies had been packed. I told myself, as I forced my legs to keep moving, that in the spring we would be seven miles ahead of all those stampeders at Lake Lindeman. We dragged our sleds along Lake Bennett, looking for a spot big enough to pitch our tent. It was here the White Pass and the Chilkoot Pass trails converged, creating another crowded tent city. Finally we found a good spot-a flat area in a small wooded cove with a forest of pine and poplar rising behind. Looking at some of the other tents squeezed between the trees, we felt lucky. We dropped, exhausted, on top of our loads. "From here on," I said to Tip, "it is easygoing. We just sit in a boat and float down the mighty Yukon for five hundred miles." Tip looked askance. "I don't see any mighty Yukon." |
