Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park Museum & Visitor Center

Top choice in Skagway

LoginSave

The recently improved NPS center is in the original 1898 White Pass & Yukon Route depot. The center is spread over two interconnecting buildings. One contains a small museum explaining some of the Klondike background with an emphasis on the two routes out of Skagway: Chilkoot Pass and White Pass. The other space is a visitor center staffed by park rangers.

At the visitor center you can sign up for free walking tours (displayed on a blackboard) and view a fabulous 25-minute film, Gold Fever: Race to the Klondike. There are usually about four tours on any given day.

Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

  • Skagway Museum

    Skagway Museum

    0.28 MILES

    Skagway Museum is not only one of the finest in a town filled with museums, but it's one of the finest in the Southeast. It occupies the entire 1st floor…

  • Dyea

    Dyea

    4.01 MILES

    In 1898 Skagway’s rival city, Dyea (die-ee) was the trailhead for Chilkoot Trail, the shortest route to Lake Bennett, where stampeders began their float…

  • Moore Homestead Museum

    Moore Homestead Museum

    0.19 MILES

    The founder of Skagway was not a gold-hungry Klondike stampeder but the savvy Captain William Moore, who arrived in the area on a hunch in 1887 and built…

  • Gold Rush Cemetery & Reid Falls

    Gold Rush Cemetery & Reid Falls

    1.72 MILES

    Visitors who become infatuated with 'Soapy' Smith and Frank Reid can walk out to this wooded cemetery, a 1.5-mile stroll northeast on State St, where…

  • Hammer Museum

    Hammer Museum

    15.76 MILES

    This extravagantly esoteric museum is an exercise in how to make hammers look interesting. And – get this – it largely succeeds. Plucked from the…

  • Jewell Gardens

    Jewell Gardens

    1.27 MILES

    If the crowds are overwhelming you, cross the Skagway River to Jewell Gardens. Located where Henry Clark started the first commercial vegetable farm in…

  • Fort Seward

    Fort Seward

    16.3 MILES

    Alaska’s first permanent military post is reached by heading uphill (east) at the Front St–Haines Hwy junction. Built in 1903 and decommissioned after…

View more attractions

Nearby Skagway attractions

1. Jeff Smith's Parlor

0.02 MILES

Soapy Smith’s old den of iniquity has recently been renovated by the National Park Service to keep the rose-tinted legend of the erstwhile conman alive…

2. Arctic Brotherhood Hall

0.04 MILES

The most outlandish building of the seven-block historical corridor along Broadway St, and possibly the most photographed building in Alaska, is this…

3. Mascot Saloon Museum

0.05 MILES

The only saloon in Alaska that doesn’t serve booze – but it did during the gold rush, and plenty of it. Built in 1898 the Mascot was one of Skagway's 80…

4. Junior Ranger Activity Center

0.11 MILES

At the Pantheon Saloon, built in 1903, kids are the customers. The historic bar is now home to the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park’s Junior…

5. Moore Homestead Museum

0.19 MILES

The founder of Skagway was not a gold-hungry Klondike stampeder but the savvy Captain William Moore, who arrived in the area on a hunch in 1887 and built…

6. Wells Fargo Bank

0.23 MILES

This bank dates back to 1916 (although it looks newer) when a group of East Coast businessmen founded the National Bank of Alaska, and built this bank a…

7. Skagway Museum

0.28 MILES

Skagway Museum is not only one of the finest in a town filled with museums, but it's one of the finest in the Southeast. It occupies the entire 1st floor…

8. Jewell Gardens

1.27 MILES

If the crowds are overwhelming you, cross the Skagway River to Jewell Gardens. Located where Henry Clark started the first commercial vegetable farm in…