Duplo's blog

Hi All,

And welcome to part five of the Duploworld summer adventure.
Unstable internet connectivity and travels has delayed it enough, now it is late monday evening, I am dead tired and probably suffering from jetlag, so do try to read around the typing errors and my poor English

the last view towards Eqi

On a very early morning a group of six hikers headed out on a two day hike.
The route we were to follow to the Indland Ice would be along the trails of Poul-Emil Viktor, a French arctic explorer, famous for his explorations of the inland ice in the 1920's or so.
Back then they used tracked vehicles to get there, however we would befollowing their trails on foot.
First part of the hike took us atop a 600 meter tall ridge, where we had our first water break. It also provided the last look towards the Eqi Glacier and what a view it was...
It was amazing just sitting there taking in the Eqi area seen from above.
From here we hiked a large plateau, before finally reaching a tine melting water lake that had enough protection from the surrounding ridges to shield us from the fierce winds that often rage at night near the inland ice.
Hiking towards the "dead glacier"

Having set up a camp and now carrying a little less weight we set off towards the Inland ice, but first we made a "slight" detour to the area where Paul-Emil Viktor originally had his second camp, a place with a wonderful view of the "dead glacier" seen in the photo above.
I guess I do not have to say that it was an amazing place to have lunch but it was
From there we hiked upwards again towards the 600 meter ridge that also marks the entry to the moraine area always found in front of the inland ice and dryland glaciers.
In this moraine area we put on an additional layer (or more) of clothes and prepared our selves to enter the frozen world of the Indland ice. In August the inland ice has already got temperatures below 0C, so extra clothing was indeed needed.
We also went over the security precautions necesarry when hiking on the inland ice.
During summer the area where we would enter, are full of large melting water rivers and lakes, but this late on the season the ice has begun freezing over again, thus lakes and rivers are all covered by a layer of ice and snow, however not thik enough to hold the weight of a person walking trying to cross. Making Indland Ice hiking a potentially dangerous affair.
Entering the Inland Ice

As we were about to clear the Moraine area, we were graced with a sight I will probably never forget.
Part of inland ice had thrusted through the final moraine ridge and now provided a perfect ramp for our ascent to the inland ice (click here for a different view to it)
The muddy grey water colour btw is due to the extremely high content of silt in the water. Silt is rock crushed to fine dustlike particles by the ice. It was an "out of this world" experience to walk up this huge "ramp" of ice and I do not think any of us were prepared for the sight that graced us as we cleared the final moraine ridge....
RM navigating the inland ice

An endless field of pressure ridges, streatching for 150 kilometers before the preasure takes off enough for the ice to settle into the smooth uniform surface people usually thinks of when talking about the inland ice
This area is one of the high preassure zones on the inland ice and we passed an abundance of rivers and lakes covered by ice and fresh snow, thus extreme care was to be taken. our destination was one of the larger ice wells in the area.
The ice well

Ice wells are what the inland ice rivers empties into. I think the best way to describe them is as large holes running the full depth of the inland ice and leading water out near the bottom of the ice.
The one seen above, is a large one and it was amazing to just lie there on the edge with head and shoulders (and camera in my case ) staring down this huge ice well. the colour transition you see is determined by how compressed the ice are, thus you will see it transitioning from white near the top of the well, into bluish deeper down.
the camp

From here we returned to the tent camp, where RM started to prepare a huge pot of rein deer stew.
The rest of us, made ourself useful gethering water and other stuff.
I think it is fair to say that sitting in these surroundings, with 5 wonderful people must have made up for pretty much one of the finest dinners I have had in quite a while. We had a good talk about the hike planned for the next day and the things experienced so far, along with stories from past adventures.
Not to mention the best instant coffee I have ever had (well make that the only decent tasting one )
As the sun set and day turned to dusk, my brother and I did a quick dash up the ridge behind the camp to get a view of the destination for the next days hike...
The "dead glacier" at dusk

More stories about this glacier to follow in part VI, but there just is something about the glooming softness of the light at dusk that I really think fits this glacier well... or at least how I felt while standing there.

Thank you for reading (if you actually made it to the bottom of this ) and do take care
I expect to have the next update up within a couple of days.

Thomas

Hi All,

And welcome to part IV of my Greenlandic summer adventure. This time taking you from Ilulissat to The Eqi Glacier, a very active glacier around 100 kilometers north of Ilulissat.
Now the way up graced us with stunning ice flakes and in general this part of the trip gave us a light that photography wise was to die for.
However nothing compared to the sight that graced us when we finally got the glacier into view
The Eqi Glacier:

In Greenland you a generally faced with 3 kinds of glaciers, well two actually, but with a twist.
Dryland glaciers are as the name implies glaciers without direct access to the fiords (the Russel glacier in Kangerlussuaq, which you will see later on, is an example)
Floating Glaciers, is glaciers having their outlet into a fiord, but were the glacier it self does not reach the bottom of the fiord (the ilulissat glacier producing the massive icebergs is a floating glacier)
And finally glaciers like the Eqi glacier, that has its outlet into a fiord but where the glacier rests on the bottom of the fiord. Now, as these glaciers rests on the fiordbed it also means that it will not produce icebergs that are as big as the ones comming from the Ilulissat glacier, upside is that you are able to get much closer to it.
Along the glacier wall:

The Eqi glacier is approx 4.5 kilometers wide, with a glacier wall anywhere from 30-100 meters tall, rising to approx 600 meters where it reaches the indland ice and with a fiord depth of anywhere from 50-150 meters. Fair to say, while a relatively small glacier, it still is a majestic sight.
Ice incomming:

Now the glaciers in this area is extremely active due to the high preassure from the inland ice.
The eqi glacier calved 5 times during the good hour we were nearby and at all times we were able to hear the thunderlike sounds of the glacier moving towards the fiord.
Now what perhaps made the most impact on me personally was watching these small flakes (about the size of a 1 large family house) break free from the top of the glacier wall and fall into the fiord, resulting in a roar of like thounder, sending a spray of water and ice more than 20 meters into the air and a wave rolling towards us of a very decent size.
A spray of ice and water:

Something I will personally never forget, but something that as you can see from the photos posted above looks rather dull in a photo, simply because one have no way to relate to the actual size of the thing.
Now from here we continued towards "Port Viktor" and "Camp Eqi"
Camp Eqi:

The camp was originally one of two camps set up before reaching the inland ice itself by French born Poul-Emil Viktor.
Poul Emil Viktor played a major role in the early indland ice explorations and it was his trails that we were to follow to the indland ice itself the next day.
The hut in the lower left corner of the photo, is actually the hut build and used by Poul-Emil Viktor in the 1920ies.
Currently 11 luxury huts (no running water or electricity though) have been built behind it and they now acts as a tour destination on their own and the first stop when hiking to the indland ice.
As we would not set of towards the indland Ice before the day after, we hooked up with HF and set off on a short hike to wards a viewpoint into a silt river area and towards the Eqi glacier.
Wathcing the glacier:

The sun kept creeping towards the horizon and as we still had a lot to prepare before setting off towards the Inland Ice the next day, we decided to head home.
After all RM had promised that she would have dinner ready when we got back and there is nothing like a good dinner when one has spend the entire day watching glaciers and hiking
How insignificant we human beings are:

On the way home the landscape really gave view to how insignificant we all are when comapared to the grandness of mother nature.
The dinner, which by the way was above excellent, was followed by coffee and happy conversations about what to expect the following two days, how to pack and prepare for the trip along with ordinary small talk and hiking stories.
When sunset came it was time to head for the huts to pack and get a good nights sleep, one last thing I did though, was to shoot another of my favourite shots from this trip.
Glacier at dusk:


Next up is "Part V - Hiking the Inland Ice", but probably not before Monday, as I am inflight between London and Salt Lake City (via Chicago) most of the day tomorrow.
Thank you for reading and do take care you all

Thomas