The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1899-09-01
The Sub-Arctic Forest.

lse to give the JOURNAL short sketch
of our travels in Alaska during the
past eighteen months, / will do the
best | can to describe the most inter-
estlng OF our trip. Such trip as we
took is the best thing I know of to
cure the ever,-gold fever.
February 23rd, 1898, w. H. Dunbar,
E. P. Dunbar, G. S. Norton, Geo. Old.
man, Thos. Taylor and myself left
Seattle on the City of Seattle for Ft
Wrangel, Alaska, near the mouth of
the Stikene river, enroute for the Cas-
sair mining district and the Tooya
river, which is the second north fork
of the Stikene. Wrangel VAS reached
on the 9th, and we found small
coast town, full of life aud business,
as are all American towrs. We stop
ped there twelve days waiting for our
freight, coming by another steamer,
and did little hunting to pass the
time away, being lucky enough to get
seven deer, for meat to start US on our
long trip up the Stikene on the ice, to
Telegraph creek, 165 miles away in
the interior of British Columbia.
April 2Sth, we reached Telegraph
in fine shape, each pulling sled with
900 pounds of freight, making the trip
In three weeks. Not very fast travel
ing, you will say, but we were all
"soft.'' and unused to such work, and
we were not in a hurry like a good
many were On the same route. We
cached our freight, all but $50 pounds
each, and struck out over the old Cas-
sler trail, that the government made
in 1874, to Dease Lake, 72a miles.
The snow was SO far gone that we
could not use our sleds on either
ground or trail, so we packed on our
DackS Dy relays.
We crossed the Tahl-Tan river, ten
miles from Telegraph, beautiful
stream, but at the crossing it comes
through a gorge 500 feet deep, not
very pretty to climb down and up
again with IS pound pack on ones
back. The Stikene above Telegraph
has wonderful can On 65 miles long
with walls of solid rock from SO to zoo
feet high, and it is not navigable for
boats of any desert ption.
We were the first white men that
ever penetrated the vast region lying
north and west of the Cassiar range,
so named by G. w. Dawson, of the
Dominion geological survey, in 1887.
We at one time incur travels crossed
an interior range of mountains north
of Tooya lake onto the streams that
flows into the Teslin Jake, and from
there into the Yukon river. We pack
ed all The way on our backs such tools
and provisions as we required, and it
was no snap, / tell you.
We prospected in this country nearly
four months, and then headed for civ
ilization, across the country to Dease
lake, Will. and /, the others having
gone out some time before. There we
became acquainted with the Holmes
Austin party, and they wanted us to
90 north with them to the Frances
Lake region, in N. w. T. We made
the necessary arrangements and Aug.
11th started down the lake with 1000
pounds of supplies in our boat. Dease
lakeis fine body of water, lying be-
tween the mountains of the Cassiar
range, % miles long by II wide, with
Dease and Thibcrt creek flowing in
from the west side. These two streams
were the richest paying streams for
gold in the whole Cassiar mining
country from '73 to rs. The gold ap-
peared to be of local origin, being
rough and course and not being worn
by moving great distance.
After leaving the Lake we started
down Dease river, stream about 100
feet wide at the mouth, and l8O miles
long to where it flows into Lizard river,
within nine miles of the d. G. bound
airy. The river is quite swift most OF
the way, crooked and bad TO navigate.
The man we had on the sweep or steer
oar, ran us on bar in the river. We
came very near upsetting and loosing
everything, but my brother and took
charge then, and were allowed to take
the boats clear through on the trip,
which we did safely. There were sew
eral very bad rapids on the river, with
Jagged and dangerous rocks sticking
up above the water, but we got through
without mishap. The lower rapids
we're said to be worse than the famous
White Horse on the Yukon river, by
men who have "shot" them both.
We we're joined by another party, and
my brother and myself were in demand
to get the boats through the rapids, as
most of the men had no experience in
swift water.
When we we're half way down the