Waking up in the fog

The thing about camping on a glacial moraine is that, while the ground looks solid, there is ice just an inch below the soil. The ground is constantly shifting as the ice slowly melts making it impossible to keep the guy lines taut.

Fog

The fog rolls in with fast wind up the glacier. Water channels are beginning to form in the snow. You can see one of our tents up on the moraine to the center-left.

What's with the weather?

We were having such a beautiful day - or maybe it was an hour, I don't remember. Then fog rolled down the valley filling everything in. That yellow dot on the medial moraine (center) is our tent. We watched that disappear moments later. Oh, let me tell you how fun and deep that slush channel was to cross in the foreground . . . none. Exactly none fun. The snow line on a glacier is not a fun place to hang out. The snow becomes temperate and isothermal - exactly 0° C throughout the snowpack. It becomes a wonderful mix of water and snow. You step in - making a hole that immediately starts to backfill with water, often waist deep. Then you step with your other foot. Sometimes this goes on for hundreds of meters before you can find a patch of bare ice, an island oasis free of slush. Use that vantage to look around, find the next ice island - that's your goal. That's your haven. Try not to fall into a moulin or crevasse along the way!