Emerald water
Green and turquoise.
Diego Delso — CC BY-SA 4.0 · pcwiles — CC BY 3.0 · NOAA Photo Library — Public domain · Boris Kasimov from Toronto, Canada — CC BY 2.0 · Wknight94 — CC BY-SA 3.0
Emerald Lake is a lake in southern Yukon, Canada, famous for its intense green colour, on the South Klondike Highway at kilometre 117.5 from Skagway, Alaska, and about 53 km south of Whitehorse in a straight line. The colour comes from light reflecting off white deposits of marl, a mix of clay and calcium carbonate, on the shallow lake bed. The calcium carbonate comes from limestone gravel eroded from the nearby mountains and dropped here by ice-age glaciers about 14,000 years ago, the same glaciers that scooped out the shallow basin. The water shades from emerald green to turquoise and blue, with white bands of marl showing through the clear water along the shores. Dense forest rings the lake, and mountains rise behind it, colouring up in autumn. Visitors stop at a pull-off beside the highway and look down on the lake. The colour is richest on sunny days with the sun high. It combines easily with the nearby Carcross Desert on the drive between Whitehorse and Skagway.
Green and turquoise.
White bands.
Behind the lake.
South Klondike Highway, southern Yukon, Canada
Light reflecting off white marl.
Sunny days.