Morning departure from the Rock Island Lake campsite left us rattling, often severely, along the Silver Trail, which is a one-way diversion from Pelly Crossing to the town of Keno. We ventured only halfway down this “roadway” in search of an alleged Mt. Haldane trail as directed by the Milepost. After some serious frustration with the road conditions and some misdirection in finding the access turn, we finally located said trail.

Facilities associated with the trail (i.e. outhouses) were in extreme disrepair and should be avoided at all costs. However, the trail itself provides much grandeur. It is actually a historic mine road and the lower quarter of the trail is fairly clear, wide and obviously well utilized by ATVs. The remainder of the trail is quite overgrown in places but does provide spectacular vistas throughout. The primary word of warning associated with this hike would be that it is a one way trail that simply goes straight up (four miles) with few switchbacks and then obviously provides an equally treacherous, consistent downhill return. The trail leads to the top of Mt. Haldane, approximately 6,000 feet. Along the way we actually walked from the rain to the sun and back into the rain. At the summit we were overrun by cloud formations literally moving up the slope into us and creating white out conditions.  All in all a highly recommended hike, but moderately strenuous given the consistent slope. It could certainly be abbreviated to the first switchback for those less interested in a several hour excursion.

Along the Silver Trail the town of Mayo offers two free municipal campgrounds, which we intended to utilize, but rainy conditions convinced us to drive rather than set up camp in the rain again. We set Dawson City as our goal and reached there quite late in the evening. The campground we had set our sights upon was closing the next day so we proceeded into town and boarded the requisite free ferry to cross the Yukon River. Because it was a fairly late crossing we had no wait and promptly entered the Yukon River Campground (a Yukon Government facility) for a short nights sleep in preparation for border crossing in the morning.