Pacific NW

Expeditions

I am convinced that we witnessed Surprise Glacier on one of its most spectacular days ever. It was constantly sloughing ice and there was a major calving event every 5 minutes. We stayed the whole day here and spent 12 hours at the face. By the middle of the day we had given names to the various features of the glacier. We each adopted our own “section” of glacier and hedged bets as to whose section would collapse first. We took great pride when our sections fell, and ignored or downplayed each other’s sections when they fell. It was great fun! There wasn’t a cat’s paw of wind all day and I was able to enjoy watching the icefalls to its fullest all day without being blown around into the icebergs. Needless to say, we were way too close to the glacier for our own good. Each time there was a loud crack it would set my heart pounding. The entire day was an adrenaline rush packed with unbelievable sights and cataclysmic ice events. Suddenly there was a series of large booms and groans, and Neptune’s entire section of ice exploded off the face sending forth an enormous cloud of churning ice through the water at 100 MPH. After the initial petrification I fumbled to start the engine, and pulled the key out of the ignition! We were fine though. Other bergs in front of us dampened the shock swell and absorbed the momentum of the wall. When huge blocks of ice fall from the glacier face, they do belly-flops into the sea and disintegrate into millions of car-sized fragments. All of those fragments plunge upwards to the surface at once and spread out in all directions very radidly, like a drop of oil on the water. The noise generated from this particular event increased until it shook the entire fjord with a sustained, gushing roar. We will never forget it. An eagle landed on top of one of the ice towers. It was unperturbed when the pinnacles of ice collapsed all around it, unflinching. I guess the eagle could just fly away if its perch exploded beneath it, unless it got sucked down by a downdraft. The bald eagle seemed to be really enjoying the show too, and stayed for a few hours. As I drifted off to sleep, vivid silent visions of blue ice blocks disintegrating and plummeting through the air filled my head.