El Chalten Ice Trekking!!!
Kara says:
El Chalten. Day 2. The Glacier trek. Things get serious.
Having gotten very excited about the Moreno glacier (see earlier blog entry - haven't you been keeping up to date?) we had to take the opportunity to actually walk about on one. This involved more of that hiking business but we were hardened climbers by now (see previous entry).
We set off at first light. Now, there's a phrase I'd often heard but never given alot of thought to. Subtly different from sunrise, first light is when there's just a hint of light in one little corner of the sky and everything seems to be whispering "you should be in bed". See photo. On the upside, you get to see a gorgeous sunrise as you're walking, turning the snowy mountains to pink.
We walked on, following our trusty guide, getting closer and closer to the big mountains and then got to the "Tyrolean bridge". A bit of a disappointment for me when it turned out to be just a bit of rope across the river, though less so for Karl who thought it was a great idea. See photo of Karl dangling perilously above the raging torrent of glacial meltwater.
Past more gorgeous scenery, mini-waterfalls of meltwater making it's way down the mountain, to the glacier. The ice on the glacier is the same sort of stuff that you get building up in your freezer when you've been neglectful, crunchy and slippy. See photo of ice, of me and Karl proudly on the glacier standing upright and not sliding down a crevass to our doom. We used (magic) crampons to stop us slipping to our deaths while walking up and down 45 and 60 degree slopes of pure ice! It's just not natural.
Photos of glacier and mountains, me peering into an ice orifice, Karl on ice (should be a Las Vegas show), and then ice-climbing. We were only able to do the ice-climbing with one ice-axe 'cause our guide lost his other one down a crevass while we were walking around on the glacier (he tried to climb down to retrieve it but couldn't for reasons along the line of "...but then I could get trapped and asphyxiate"). Photos of me attacking the ice with ice-axe as I dominate that face and of Karl having proudly conquered another summit. And photo of us exiting from the glacier, I'm the one waving my hands in the air.
Glaciers. Fanbloodytastic.
And I almost forgot about my near-death experience! As we were climbling back up the moraine (big pile of boulders, rocks, stones, gravel) I was just behind our guide when he knocked loose a really big rock that we all watched go bang, bang, bang all the way down to the lake below. I kindof thought "hmmm, that could've hurt if I'd been a bit closer" but our guide had an "Oh My God I almost Killed You" look. And then he shook my hand in an "Are you really still alive" way and said "I've been stepping on that rock for ten years". I didn't think too much of it but later on our guide was still talking about it and his other woman-almost-flattend-by-large-rolling-boulder story.
El Chalten. Day 2. The Glacier trek. Things get serious.
Having gotten very excited about the Moreno glacier (see earlier blog entry - haven't you been keeping up to date?) we had to take the opportunity to actually walk about on one. This involved more of that hiking business but we were hardened climbers by now (see previous entry).
We set off at first light. Now, there's a phrase I'd often heard but never given alot of thought to. Subtly different from sunrise, first light is when there's just a hint of light in one little corner of the sky and everything seems to be whispering "you should be in bed". See photo. On the upside, you get to see a gorgeous sunrise as you're walking, turning the snowy mountains to pink.
We walked on, following our trusty guide, getting closer and closer to the big mountains and then got to the "Tyrolean bridge". A bit of a disappointment for me when it turned out to be just a bit of rope across the river, though less so for Karl who thought it was a great idea. See photo of Karl dangling perilously above the raging torrent of glacial meltwater.
Past more gorgeous scenery, mini-waterfalls of meltwater making it's way down the mountain, to the glacier. The ice on the glacier is the same sort of stuff that you get building up in your freezer when you've been neglectful, crunchy and slippy. See photo of ice, of me and Karl proudly on the glacier standing upright and not sliding down a crevass to our doom. We used (magic) crampons to stop us slipping to our deaths while walking up and down 45 and 60 degree slopes of pure ice! It's just not natural.
Photos of glacier and mountains, me peering into an ice orifice, Karl on ice (should be a Las Vegas show), and then ice-climbing. We were only able to do the ice-climbing with one ice-axe 'cause our guide lost his other one down a crevass while we were walking around on the glacier (he tried to climb down to retrieve it but couldn't for reasons along the line of "...but then I could get trapped and asphyxiate"). Photos of me attacking the ice with ice-axe as I dominate that face and of Karl having proudly conquered another summit. And photo of us exiting from the glacier, I'm the one waving my hands in the air.
Glaciers. Fanbloodytastic.
And I almost forgot about my near-death experience! As we were climbling back up the moraine (big pile of boulders, rocks, stones, gravel) I was just behind our guide when he knocked loose a really big rock that we all watched go bang, bang, bang all the way down to the lake below. I kindof thought "hmmm, that could've hurt if I'd been a bit closer" but our guide had an "Oh My God I almost Killed You" look. And then he shook my hand in an "Are you really still alive" way and said "I've been stepping on that rock for ten years". I didn't think too much of it but later on our guide was still talking about it and his other woman-almost-flattend-by-large-rolling-boulder story.
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