From Watson Lake to Teslin
July 6-7, 2008

Sign forest at Watson Lake





Watson Lake is most known for the sign forest. It was started by a lonely GI in 1942, who put up a sign to his hometown in Illinois. Other soldiers started adding signs to their hometowns; in recent years the tradition exploded into a virtual forest of signs of all sorts imaginable; people put up license plates, paper plates with handwritten signs, etc. It has gotten rather absurd.


sign to my hometown





Wandering among the signs, we didn't find any signs to where we live, but we did see that the sign to Gil's birthplace, that we found four years ago, is still there.



Heading west to Teslin we crossed the (other) Continental Divide, which separates the Yukon River drainage area from the Mackenzie River drainage area. These are the two largest river drainage areas in North America, even larger than the Mississippi drainage area where we live. The Yukon flows west into the Bering Sea, and the Mackenzie flows northwest into the Beaufort Sea, which is part of the Arctic ocean.

view of Teslin Lake
View of Teslin Lake and the village of Teslin.

George Johnston museum


In Teslin we stopped at the George Johnston museum, which was very interesting and well worth the stop. George Johnston was a Tlingit who lived from 1893 to 1972. He was an avid photographer who took a lot of photos of Tlingit life and culture from 1910 to 1940. In 1928, he bought a  Chevrolet (seen here) and had it brought from Whitehorse to Teslin by boat; it was the first automobile in Teslin. The fact that there were no roads in Teslin didn't stop him; he built a 3 mile road so he could drive the car in the summer. His road is now part of the Alaska Highway. Nature provided a 70 mile road for him in winter by freezing Teslin lake. George's primary source of income was from hunting and trapping. In winter he painted the car white to camouflage it, so he could use it for hunting on the frozen lake.

Tlingit Heritage Museum




Another stop in Teslin was the Tlingit Heritage Centre, which focused more on the culture of the coastal Tlinkits. The museum was not as interesting as the George Johnston museum, but they did have a couple of Tlingit canoes. This one, although painted in the traditional style, is modern; it is made of fiberglas.

Tlingit dugout canoe





They also had a dugout canoe, which are more traditional. The dugouts are made from a single cedar log; cedar trees of this size are available in the coastal region, but not here. This one is in the process of being painted.

camping at Mukluk Annie's place




We camped that night at Mukluk Annie's restaurant, which is about five miles north of Teslin. Since we had camped in Teslin the previous night, we traveled all of about 5 miles that day. Mukluk Annie provides free RV parking with a gorgeous view of Teslin Lake. Muklak Annie's restaurant specializes in salmon cooked on a grill. The food was very good, as well as being reasonably priced.

Mukluk Chuck







Mukluk Annie's husband Chuck, seen here, gives a free houseboat ride to salmon bake customers. Despite the Yukon name, Annie and Chuck are originally from Minnesota, but have been here since 1967.

boat ride




As we motored out on to the lake, many gulls started following the boat. After about half an hour we found out why. Chuck stopped the boat and passed out bread to the passengers to feed the gulls with. It was fun tossing the bread into the air and watching the gulls catch it on the fly. Boy, did they squawk when Chuck restarted the engine and started back home; their snack time had ended. Chuck follows this routine with every trip, so the gulls are expecting to be fed.