Welcome to
Whitehorse, YT
The Wilderness City
Your first stop is the MacBride Museum of Yukon History.
In 1950, a group of far-sighted Yukoners dedicated to preserving heritage started the Yukon Historical Society, the first organization of its kind in the Territory.
Co-founder William MacBride was an employee of the White Pass & Yukon Route Company and was able to salvage outdated transportation equipment for posterity in the unoccupied Government Telegraph Office, built in 1900. In the 1950s and 60s, this building housed the growing collection and was open to the public as a museum during the summer. Volunteers were responsible for all the activities of the YHS and later the MacBride Museum Society until the mid-1980s, when the first curator/director was hired.
Nowadays, the museum illustrates, shares, and protects Yukon’s objects and stories and is also a community meeting place, an archive, as well as a centre for learning.
Legend says Whitehorse got its name when gold seekers thought Miles Canyon’s wild rapids resembled the manes of charging white horses.
Whitehorse is the capital of Yukon, located on the Yukon (Lewes) River just below Miles Canyon and the former Whitehorse Rapids (now submerged beneath Schwatka Lake, created after 1958 by a hydropower dam).
It is the Yukon headquarters of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and is an important transportation centre on the Alaska Highway, linked by air to major North American cities. It has long been an outfitting base for anglers, big-game hunters, and trappers.
In 2011, the World Health Organization ranked Whitehorse #1 for cleanest air in the world, and the Whitehorse area has over 700 kilometres of marked trail, including 85 kilometres of groomed cross country ski trails. What a great place to go for a hike!
Up there in the Yukon, hiking is life, and the options are endless, meaning it can be tough to know where to start. According to the Yukon Visitor Information Centres, here are the best 7 trails in the Yukon:
- The Gunnar Nilsson & Mickey Lammers Research Forest
- Golden Sides, Tombstone Territorial Park
- Spirit Canyon, Whitehorse
- Mount White, Atlin Road
- The Midnight Dome, Dawson City
- Hidden Lakes Trail, Whitehorse
- Fish Lake Trail, Whitehorse
You can’t miss them. Enjoy your runs, walks, and hikes, and keep going. See you at the next stop, Watson Lake, YK.
Photo credits: MacBride Museum of Yukon History, Travel Yukon, @airb28 via Instagram and Yukon Hiking.