The crampon blades dig in hard, though they barely hurt that frozen giant. And you feel a whole living glacier beneath your feet. In some stretches, you can hear the sound of water flowing forcefully right under you.
A sense of insecurity, of respect, of fear—why not admit it?—fear that suddenly that crevasse you’re jumping might open up, that the ice might give way, that you might fall. But that doesn’t happen, and the fear gives way to the adrenaline that unleashes nervously inside, to the fascination of stepping on millenary ice.
Your eyes wander incredulously from side to side, from the great tongue of ice that seems to rush headlong towards you, to the different shades of white and blue that you discover for the first time. Then you want more, you want to quickly learn how to handle yourself with crampons, you want to move defiantly toward that frozen tongue, feel how it breathes, discover crevasses, look inside them… Thus, the cunning adventurer inside you sheds the insecurity and comes out to enjoy, with all five senses, the glacier beneath your feet.
It’s not easy to get there. The Root Glacier is not exactly very accessible. It is located in Alaska, inside the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, the largest in the entire United States, six times larger than Yellowstone, for example. Driving, you have to overcome the unfairly feared McCarthy road, a road that connects Chitina with the picturesque mining town of McCarthy (we will write a post about this area later). From there, you can take a transfer that, for five dollars, comfortably completes the eight-kilometer distance to the old copper mines of Kennicott or set your feet in motion to arrive on foot. A beautiful trek, without a doubt, but remember that a route on top of a glacier awaits you. Of course, we realized that later.
Once at the old Kennicott mines, a short break to recover energy with views, in the distance, of the imposing Chugach Mountains. Of course, this ghost town, full of rusty rails and mine carts, wooden buildings on the verge of collapse, and vestiges of a golden age buried under reddish planks, deserves much more attention.
But there are still another three kilometers on foot, now accompanied by the guide, to the entrance of the glacier. If ‘luck’ is on your side, you might run into one of the bears that roam the area. Facing the ice, mounds of earth seem to halt the glacier’s advance. However, the glacier is not advancing, but retreating, and all those mounds of debris are nothing but a disguise under which there is still a living glacier trying to survive climate change. And the last stretch of the path winds sinuously alongside that agony of nature.
From then on, only ice and more ice beneath your feet. Little by little, you discover the secrets that you couldn’t imagine finding from afar. You witness with excitement the discovery of small bright blue lakes and peek cautiously into holes whose bottom is impossible to guess. You walk under a thin waterfall that has carved a groove and seems to whisper shyly as it slides down the ice. Your crampons navigate crevasses in the surface, violent scars that draw the face of this ancient glacier. You encounter vertical walls that can be climbed armed with a harness, rope, and ice axe. And you never get tired.
That was the Root Glacier in June 2010. Surely, it is very different now because, like every living thing, it is also in continuous change. And that is, without a doubt, the essence of its magic. Perhaps that lake no longer exists and the crevasses have widened until it’s impossible to cross from one side to the other. I could go back and find it even more fascinating. However, I doubt I would again find the virgin emotion of that day, the innocence with which my eyes opened to the landscape for the first time, the brand-new sensations that made having a glacier under my feet the most intensely enjoyed experience until then.
Image gallery:
Some practical data:When to go:
Logically, the Alaskan winter is very harsh. The hike on a glacier is only possible from late May to early September when the ablation zone is free of snow and accessible.
Where to sleep:
If you travel by motorhome and risk taking it there (it’s practically impossible to find a company whose insurance covers driving on McCarthy Road), you can spend the night at the campsite at the end of the road for $20 a night. It’s very basic—some picnic tables, a fire pit, a water tank, and nothing else—but it’s on the riverbank and has spectacular views.
If you arrive by small plane, you have several options at various prices in both McCarthy and Kennicott.
Activities:We did the glacier hiking with the company Kennicott Wilderness GuidesIt lasts between four and five hours, includes a specialized guide and technical equipment, but you have to bring your own food. The best part is that you don’t need experience. It costs $60 per person, but if you’re going to do more activities in Alaska, it might pay off to buy the Tour Saver ($99), a discount coupon book with which you will get a 2-for-1 deal on many things.
Essential:
Don’t carry too much so you don’t get overly tired. Don’t forget water to stay hydrated along the way and some energy food to refuel while sitting on the glacier ice. The weather there changes rapidly and it’s not unusual for the rain to surprise you, so bring a good raincoat, breathable if possible and, of course, warm clothing in layers—you are in the mountains. Footwear is also very important; we wore good Gore-Tex hiking boots.
Watch out for:
A glacier is not a theme park. You must be very cautious and listen carefully to all the guide’s instructions because your safety depends on it. Oh, you are in bear territory…
Left to do:
Uff…. flying over the park in a small plane, staying overnight on the glacier itself, ice climbing… should I continue?
Eight o’clock in the morning. Someone knocks on the door of our camper where we had just spent…
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