A steady and continuous stream of argonauts marks the way from Skaguay
to Lake Bennett these bright, beautiful winter days. Some of them are pulling their own well loaded sleds; others are using horses and still others have developed into full fledged "bull punchers." Men pulling their own outfits are carrying from two to four hundred pounds, and with horses or work steers they are carrying from 1,000 to 1,500. A favorite and most satisfactory method of work with those who use animals is to employ two, or even three, Yukon sleds, drawn tandem. When a bad place is reached the sleds are uncoupled and one at a time taken over.
No one ever hears now the topic that used to gather eager and anxious groups of men on the streets of the town: "Is Skaguay a winter trail?" Every one knows that at the present time it is the only winter trail. There is no blockade on this trail. Men leave Skaguay and go without hindrance or delay to Lake Bennett. Once or twice this winter an unusually severe storm has held travellers for a day at the foot of the summit, but that is all.
Poor Lopez is the only one who has lost his life on this trail, and he was foolish enough to start out alone, without food, or without knowledge of what he was going against, and wearing clothes that would have better became a summer afternoon.
Up the trail, and over the summit, the weather is cold, crisp and dry. When fresh snow falls it is like eider down, so light and fluffy. Once or twice this winter it has rained and thawed after a deep snow, and in consequence there are at most places hard crusts, almost amounting to solid ice. All the unevenesses of the road are obliterated, and the broken trail is fast becoming a good imitation of an asphalt boulevard.
There has been some water flowing over the ice below Porcupine as a result of the past few warm days, but that is stopped now and the river is a sheet of ice, well leveled with travel up that far. The broken trail through the box canyon, that used to be so rough with boulders, has benefited most of all by the repeated and alternating snows, thaws and freezes, and it is now in almost perfect condition. The river bed from the canyon to the first bridge has been broken up and allowed to freeze again several times, so that there is now no "shelf" ice, and the deep snows have made it possible to beat a road around the deep cuts in the water course.
The "White Pass," that was last summer a mockery of the word "pass," is today being trod by hundreds of heavy draft horses, light cayuses and lumbering oxen. Men pulling their own outfits lighten to about a hundred pounds at that point because of the
steepness of the ascent, but all are moving rapidly and making good progress.
One does not find large encampments along the road now, because everyone is taking advantage of the marvelously fine weather to get over the divide. Presently Lake Bennett, at the point where the Skaguay trail strikes it, will be a young city.
The Skaguay pessimist is singing very small these days. Last summer's trail, new and undeveloped, went to pieces under the foot falls of 5,000 horses. The Dyea winter trail had been in use twenty years, hence it was the best and would always the best, if for no other reason than that the Indians used it, and the Indians never made a mistake. The pessimist forgets that the Indian had selected his path to carry his stuff on
his back, and that the white man never contemplated being transformed into a pack horse.
The first white man that came into the country began to look about for a path on which he could use his best servant, the horse. About two years ago the White pass was found, but there were few people to use it, and no horses, so it was not used much. Last summer a few boulders were moved a little and the trees were blazed. Everyone knew that two or three difficult hills were crossed that need not have been, and several stretches of small timbers were laid in the mud and called "corduroy."
So last summer the Skaguay trail was not a glittering success. The pessimist now says, "well, I admit that the Skaguay trail is all right for winter time, but just wait for the snow to go! It will be nowhere." The pessimist forgets that the same people who have built a town of 7000 people in five months with a million dollars worth of buildings are looking to the Skaguay trail - with what it may develop into - for their continued growth and prosperity. The prediction is safe, that these people will see to it that there is a summer trail.
The town council of Skaguay has granted to the wagon road a franchise to
occupy Runnalls street with a narrow guage steam road. Mr. Brackett has already set a gang of men to work getting ready for the iron work and engines which are expected not later than February 15th. A month later the road will be in operation.
Mr. Brackett has promised the council to have the wagon road proper completed to the summit by Feb. 10th. From that point to Bennett the snow road will be serviceable until May 1st. Before that time the wagon road will be completed to Bennett, and goods may be hauled by double team from the terminus of the narrow guage road to Bennett at a cost so low that the transportation of goods from salt water to the Youkon river districts will be an ordinary commercial proposition.
What then: Well, the balance of the story hinges on the resources and capacity of Alaska for permanent development. The most disappointed gold seeker returning from the interior has not ventured one word questioning the marvellous wealth of Alaska in gold. But in the wild unreasoning rush for yellow nuggets, Alaska's vast underground treasury has been neglected or forgotten up to date. Perhaps the difficulties of intercourse and transportation have made it unprofitable to stop for less than big gold nuggets that can be immediately transformed into money without the expenditure ordinarily incident to
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