So we’ve all seen mountaineering expeditions on the National Geographic and Discovery channels. Human beings fighting hard against the enormity of nature and revelling in the huge personal challenge to overcome the cold and forge on over ice and snow across terrain that is breathtakingly beautiful and at the same time terrifyingly treacherous. And lounging comfortably in front of my telly snug and cozy I would often think – I would like to give this kind of adventure a go. But, to get to walking on fields of ice and glaciers, one would have to be a keen mountaineer, have the stamina and the resources to partake in a trek that would already be in its 3rd or 4th day before it reached the snowline.
But in New Zealand I had my opportunity to go ice hiking, without the rigmarole of a long trek, or the necessity to climb a couple of thousand meters.
This was thanks to a glacier called the Franz Josef.
New Zealand’s south Island has a mountain chain called the Southern Alps that have been formed by the collision of two of the earth’s major seismic plates. The eastern (Pacific) and the western (Australian) plates are currently grinding together along a fault that runs diagonally through the South Island pushing up the land to form the Southern Alps.
Right, so thanks for the geography lesson but what has this to do with walking on ice.
Everything! These Southern Alps stop the moisture laden winds called the roaring forties and they precipitate into snow and ice high on the mountain tops. Thanks to the topography of the mountains, of the 140 or so glaciers high above, two reach right down into the rain forests. One of them is the Franz Josef Glacier.
This glacier has spawned a village named after it and now this 21km long fast moving and slow melting tongue of ice is quite literally enjoying its place in the sun as all activities around this village are focussed on this glacier.
And so this May I had my chance to play Edmund Hillary. Though guided tours on this glacier started way back in 1903, these involved an arduous hike through the rainforest and some serious climbing before getting onto the glacier. Today helicopters have changed all that.
A beautiful day greeted me when I threw open the curtains of my bed room at the Holly Homestead, a charming B & B just outside the village and at 10.15am I reported to the Helicopter Line office. The plan was quite simple. Get into a helicopter, fly around taking in gorgeous views of the glacier and the Pacific Ocean and then get dropped off on the glacier itself for a two hour hike before being picked up again. This activity is unique to the Franz Josef glacier because it reaches so far down from the mountains. Anywhere else in the world for an activity like this you’d have to go at least 10,000 feet high and then too you’d have to be properly acclimatised to the height. Here we’d be at just 800 feet above sea level and walking on ice.
The exercise started off with everyone’s weight and shoe sizes being taken. Like everyone else I was dressed in 4 layers of warm clothing and comfortable walking pants. With tons of ice around you, it does get chilly even in bright sunlight.
Next we were handed part of our equipment, which comprised of sturdy walking boots and a waist pouch which contains steel crampons which we would have to strap on to the shoes once on the ice.
The helicopter ride to the glacier gave me my first perspective of the enormity of this ice mass. It looks like a narrow strip of smooth snow from the village but as we flew in over it I saw that its surface was made up of little hillocks and crevasses of ice. The pilot expertly banked the chopper against the imposing mountainsides and neatly landed on a flattened small circular patch of ice that served as the glacial helipad. The moment we stepped out of the chopper all 8 of us became spontaneous contortionists. Solid ice and rubber soles don’t exactly agree about grip and we realised the best thing to do was standstill and try to strap on the crampons without any jerky movements.
With the crampons on, the ice lost its slippery edge and the metal crampons dug into it to provide a comforting grip. Guiding us that morning was Gabriel, hugely experienced in ice craft; he gave us an interesting briefing on the techniques we needed to use in negotiating our way across the glacier. First off he told us to always keep our feet well apart, because if both the crampons came together, there was a chance they might lock up and we’d fall flat on our faces. Secondly he told us how to negotiate steep ice slopes and finally he explained the right way to use our ice axes.
The briefing done, we set off in a single file. At places where the slopes were too steep, Gabriel would hack out makeshift steps in the ice to make it easier for us. Walking along that glacier I realized that even though it was just frozen ice, the surface had such varying features. There were ice caves, crevasses, narrow gullys and ridges. There were also narrow passageways formed by the centre of huge block of ice melting away and we had to squeeze through these sideways. And, in such close proximity with huge chunks of ice you could actually feel the warmth being sucked away from your body neve mind the four layers of clothing and the fleece.
Gabriel made the walk interesting by feeding us riveting bits of information regarding the creation and movement of the glacier. He explained that if we looked around, we’d realize that the ice had a blueish tint. This is due to the Rayleigh effect. Tiny air b
ubbles and matter suspended in the ice scatter light in all directions. This scattering affects light of shorter wavelength more that that of longer wavelength and that’s why the short wavelength blue – violet light is refracted back first. Besides this, it was a wonderfully clear day and the ink blue sky was also being reflected in little pools of water.
He also explained that the Franz is mainly an advancing glacier. It has retreated a few times but mainly it advances. This means that the snow fall high above is mostly more than the rate of melt and this pushes the glacier on towards the rainforests.
Ice walking needs to done with concentration and although we had Gabriel leading us through the safe paths, there were some places where the ice was really thin and this is exactly where you don’t want to put your foot. Also, since we were all walking in a single file, a ledge which was strong enough to take the first 4 walkers might start to become weak after the fifth one passed over it. So this certainly was not a walk in the park and every step had to be paid attention to, but then, this is what made it fantastically exciting. And by the time we finished our circuit and made our way back to the ice helipad all of us had got into the knack of things.
Once the crampons came off it was once again a little wiggly waggly walk short walk on the slippery ice pathway to the chopper which lifted off and put us down in the village in a short 7 minute flight.
So next time you watch mountaineers struggling on ice on telly, remember that there’s a charming little country called New Zealand in the south pacific which has a very obliging glacier called the Franz Josef that will give you all your ice hiking thrill without the effort and hardship that those poor guys on TV have gone through.
[Franz Josef lies on the West coast of New Zealand go to www.west-coast.co.nz to find out more. There are plenty of hotels, motels and lodges. The one I stayed at was Holly Homestead. Run by a charming local couple who know the area very well. www.hollyhomestead.co.nz]
But in New Zealand I had my opportunity to go ice hiking, without the rigmarole of a long trek, or the necessity to climb a couple of thousand meters.
This was thanks to a glacier called the Franz Josef.
New Zealand’s south Island has a mountain chain called the Southern Alps that have been formed by the collision of two of the earth’s major seismic plates. The eastern (Pacific) and the western (Australian) plates are currently grinding together along a fault that runs diagonally through the South Island pushing up the land to form the Southern Alps.
Right, so thanks for the geography lesson but what has this to do with walking on ice.
Everything! These Southern Alps stop the moisture laden winds called the roaring forties and they precipitate into snow and ice high on the mountain tops. Thanks to the topography of the mountains, of the 140 or so glaciers high above, two reach right down into the rain forests. One of them is the Franz Josef Glacier.
This glacier has spawned a village named after it and now this 21km long fast moving and slow melting tongue of ice is quite literally enjoying its place in the sun as all activities around this village are focussed on this glacier.And so this May I had my chance to play Edmund Hillary. Though guided tours on this glacier started way back in 1903, these involved an arduous hike through the rainforest and some serious climbing before getting onto the glacier. Today helicopters have changed all that.
A beautiful day greeted me when I threw open the curtains of my bed room at the Holly Homestead, a charming B & B just outside the village and at 10.15am I reported to the Helicopter Line office. The plan was quite simple. Get into a helicopter, fly around taking in gorgeous views of the glacier and the Pacific Ocean and then get dropped off on the glacier itself for a two hour hike before being picked up again. This activity is unique to the Franz Josef glacier because it reaches so far down from the mountains. Anywhere else in the world for an activity like this you’d have to go at least 10,000 feet high and then too you’d have to be properly acclimatised to the height. Here we’d be at just 800 feet above sea level and walking on ice.
The exercise started off with everyone’s weight and shoe sizes being taken. Like everyone else I was dressed in 4 layers of warm clothing and comfortable walking pants. With tons of ice around you, it does get chilly even in bright sunlight.
Next we were handed part of our equipment, which comprised of sturdy walking boots and a waist pouch which contains steel crampons which we would have to strap on to the shoes once on the ice.The helicopter ride to the glacier gave me my first perspective of the enormity of this ice mass. It looks like a narrow strip of smooth snow from the village but as we flew in over it I saw that its surface was made up of little hillocks and crevasses of ice. The pilot expertly banked the chopper against the imposing mountainsides and neatly landed on a flattened small circular patch of ice that served as the glacial helipad. The moment we stepped out of the chopper all 8 of us became spontaneous contortionists. Solid ice and rubber soles don’t exactly agree about grip and we realised the best thing to do was standstill and try to strap on the crampons without any jerky movements.
With the crampons on, the ice lost its slippery edge and the metal crampons dug into it to provide a comforting grip. Guiding us that morning was Gabriel, hugely experienced in ice craft; he gave us an interesting briefing on the techniques we needed to use in negotiating our way across the glacier. First off he told us to always keep our feet well apart, because if both the crampons came together, there was a chance they might lock up and we’d fall flat on our faces. Secondly he told us how to negotiate steep ice slopes and finally he explained the right way to use our ice axes.
The briefing done, we set off in a single file. At places where the slopes were too steep, Gabriel would hack out makeshift steps in the ice to make it easier for us. Walking along that glacier I realized that even though it was just frozen ice, the surface had such varying features. There were ice caves, crevasses, narrow gullys and ridges. There were also narrow passageways formed by the centre of huge block of ice melting away and we had to squeeze through these sideways. And, in such close proximity with huge chunks of ice you could actually feel the warmth being sucked away from your body neve mind the four layers of clothing and the fleece.
Gabriel made the walk interesting by feeding us riveting bits of information regarding the creation and movement of the glacier. He explained that if we looked around, we’d realize that the ice had a blueish tint. This is due to the Rayleigh effect. Tiny air b
ubbles and matter suspended in the ice scatter light in all directions. This scattering affects light of shorter wavelength more that that of longer wavelength and that’s why the short wavelength blue – violet light is refracted back first. Besides this, it was a wonderfully clear day and the ink blue sky was also being reflected in little pools of water.He also explained that the Franz is mainly an advancing glacier. It has retreated a few times but mainly it advances. This means that the snow fall high above is mostly more than the rate of melt and this pushes the glacier on towards the rainforests.
Ice walking needs to done with concentration and although we had Gabriel leading us through the safe paths, there were some places where the ice was really thin and this is exactly where you don’t want to put your foot. Also, since we were all walking in a single file, a ledge which was strong enough to take the first 4 walkers might start to become weak after the fifth one passed over it. So this certainly was not a walk in the park and every step had to be paid attention to, but then, this is what made it fantastically exciting. And by the time we finished our circuit and made our way back to the ice helipad all of us had got into the knack of things.
Once the crampons came off it was once again a little wiggly waggly walk short walk on the slippery ice pathway to the chopper which lifted off and put us down in the village in a short 7 minute flight.
So next time you watch mountaineers struggling on ice on telly, remember that there’s a charming little country called New Zealand in the south pacific which has a very obliging glacier called the Franz Josef that will give you all your ice hiking thrill without the effort and hardship that those poor guys on TV have gone through.
[Franz Josef lies on the West coast of New Zealand go to www.west-coast.co.nz to find out more. There are plenty of hotels, motels and lodges. The one I stayed at was Holly Homestead. Run by a charming local couple who know the area very well. www.hollyhomestead.co.nz]
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