One of the most amazing experiences of a trip which has been filled with them. From Franz Joseph town we were taken by bus to the start of the walk to the Franz Joseph Glacier. The scale of the glacier is difficult to describe and although it looked no distance away it was almost an hour before we reached the safety ropes. At this point our guide Cliff (insert your own sea gull gag) took us into the area at the base of the glacier's terminal moraine and we put the crampons onto our boots ready for our day adventure walk on the ice. The first part was a steep climb up the face of the glacier, a mix of rock debris and ice, which had steps roughly cut into the ice forming a rough staircase over the terminal moraine. Eventually we reached the "clean" ice, a gleaming mix of white and blue ice with a dusting of rock dust. Cliff took us into crevasses, cutting a pathway of steps as he went.
There were some spectacular moments – Mary threw herself into Benji's arms at one point as we climbed down into a crevasse; I managed a particularly spectacular trip and fell headlong on the ice, slithering forward, penguin like on my front! At one point as we passed through an ice arch I also managed to step into a deep puddle of icy glacial melt up to my knee. Cold? Yessss!
No comments:
Post a Comment