Aletsch-Glacier -- an unforgettable Saturday

(Above: Blue thistles and pink lupins on a slope in the centre of Bettmeralp, VS, Switzerland)


Hi again

Still busy and "still crazy after all these years... " :)

Apologies to anyone who has been holding their breath for Vals photos. You'll just have to go on breathing through your gills for a little longer, but I will post them.

Right now, however, I simply MUST share some absolutely extraordinary photos with you from the Valais/Aletsch Glacier, one of Europe's biggest glaciers. Mind you, if things continue as they well may, it will be gone in 80 years' time!

So, do your bit for the climate, use public transport, cover your saucepan with a lid when you boil an egg, switch lights off, use energye-fficient appliances, walk up and down stairs, give up smoking, ride a bicycle, lobby your MP for more energy-efficient policies, recycle, write letters of protest against waste, treat your environment as if it were your bathroom/kitchen/living-room/bedroom -- because, in fact, it is!

And brace yourself for a huge post -- some seventy photos and comment. But I hope it will have been worth your while when you reach the end. Thank you for your time, and for your comments, should you wish to leave any.
Peace!

(above: Dawn in Berne, Saturday, August 18, 2007, about 5:30)

By now I'm almost sure you have heard of Greenpeace/Spencer Tunick's Glacier Installations, Tunickglacier 2007. Well, I was there.

Yes, posing without a stitch of clothing, sans jewellery, sunglasses, exposed to the elements, to the rough surface of the glacier, standing in my birthday suit right next to a crevasse, next to only about 599 fellow human beings, young, old, fair, dark, grizzled, bare-faced, bearded, short-haired, long-haired, fat, slim, white, pink, beige, brown. Together, we generated the most unbelievable energy.

Let's hope this amazing living installation will kick the powers that be into action to really DO SOMETHING to make sure people can still enjoy life on this wondrous planet in forty, fifty, sixty ... years' time, and beyond.

And don't let them sell you the nuclear power idea, either -- once these magnificent glaciers are gone, rivers will flow so irregularly that it will most likely be impractical to cool nuclear power generators using river water. (Not to mention the nuclear waste the planet will have to deal with for tens of thousands of years.)

Here are some of my own visual impressions of the day (scroll to end if you want to see a photo by a Greenpeace photographer, and for some links to YouTube videos of the event):
Above: View from the cable car from Betten to Bettmeralp. White dots on the valley floor are houses of Brig.
The day was stunning -- below: view from Bettmeralp almost due south. It was about 9:30 AM. We assembled outside the cable car station for Bettmenstock/Bettmergrat.
One Greenpeace helper told me some 2000 people had signed up for the day. Official number: some 600 participants in Spencer Tunick's living installations above and on the Grosser Aletschgletscher.
View from the cablecar taking us up to Bettmerstock/Bettmergrat. Those glaciers up there look like they have shrunk massively in recent years. There's a huge grey area below where not even lichen has had time to grow yet.
Above: View south-west from Bettmerstock. The little dark triangle on the horizon, middle, is -- yes -- the Matterhorn! Below: 180° in the other direction, the Bettmerstock itself, a cone of massive boulders. Very instable. Like oversized scree. We were going to see more of that as the day progressed.
Below: We've just set out on the first leg of the walk. About 45 minutes should take us to the location of the first installation. Can't wait!The striking cone of the Zenbaechenhorn -- the Peak of the Ten Streams is one possible translation of its name. Where's the glacier we have all come to see?
Here it is. And here are some of my fellow-treckers negotiating a mountain trail that is not to be taken lightly. It crosses a massive slope of oversized scree. We had been warned. Instructions were clear: only register if you can manage a four to five-hour mountain walk at 2,600 to 2,000 m altitude.
A long, long trail of men and women (and a few youngsters) walking across the rocks single file. Every now and then, I'd venture a look left to admire the breathtaking views:The Driestgletscher and the Zenbaechengletscher (Gletscher = glacier) look ridiculously small. About eighty years ago they reached right down to the grey line above the Great Aletsch Glacier, which was 200 m thicker. There are many photos to prove this, just Google Aletschgletscher and you'll find many older photos that show the ice line much higher up. The maps tell the same story. I had a pretty hard time identifying peaks because the snow and ice cover that's represented on the maps only twenty years old or so has vanished.
The Zenbaechenhorn and the Olmenhorn, with a cut-off tributary to the Great Aletsch Glacier between them. The dark streaks marking the big glacier are bands of debris pulled off the mountain sides. This glacier is actually three glaciers that joined upstream at what is known as Konkordiaplatz, at centre in the photo below:It is still a massive glacier, but as more ice melts, more rock is exposed that reflects less sun and stores more heat, accelerating snow and ice melt even further.

We have reached the location of the first installation. Press photographers have already begun to set up their gear behind a line marked with red-and-white ribbons:I'm beginning to realize this is something pretty big. Great! The more attention this gets, the better.One of many Greenpeace volunteers who were always on hand. We humble participants grabbed a quick bite and gulp as we waited for more people to arrive. I wonder, is it his videos one can see on the You Tube site (see end of this post)?The lady with the blonde plaits practices the art of living; the lady in pink is a journalist from Geneva. I wish I had asked her for her card! Participants came from almost all over the world, even from Indonesia. I spoke to a girl from Morocco, two girls from Catalonia, a young Scotsman, a gentleman from Baden-Baden in Germany and many, many more --

After the first installation -- finding our gear hidden among the boulders and getting dressed balancing on wobbly rocks was quite tricky -- we continued on our way towards the glacier location for Installation no. 2. Here's two looks back at the boulder slope and the long line of people still coming out of it:.. and the long zig-zag line of people who have already gone ahead. If you click on the image, you should see a bigger version ...
... and see the people better as they make their way toward the place where the Maerjela valley drops into the Aletsch Glacier's bed. That's where we'll be having our next little break.
We're getting nearer and nearer the glacier as we walk across the slope marked Roti Chumma on my map:The glacier is bumpy, with deep cracks. Close-ups to follow in next post. We're fast approaching our lunch assembly point. Time: about 12:30/1PM. Stomachs are rumbling, throats are dry. The rock is suddenly much smoother, with noticeable scars where debris in the ice has scored its surface.It's good to sit and wait a little while for the last people in the file to arrive. But there's barely time for a drink before we receive instructions on what will happen next. We have to get ready for a steep descent to where the rock meets the ice.Already the first people have reached almost the top of the first assembly point on the glacier. Have there ever been so many people on it at the same time? I think not. Fantastic! One glacier mouth. Shame I can't make you hear the faint gurgling that accompanied our every step. It was as if the glacier's soul was talking to us. No birds, though. Not a single chough. I suppose they're all up-glacier at Jungfraujoch, where there are more people and morsels of food to be had.
The Greenpeace mountaineers prepped the location well. Red-and-white tape marked the boundaries of the area that was comparatively safe to walk on. They had also installed ropes to help us make the steep climb onto the glacier. I was really glad I had brought my walking poles. Felt a lot safer. Mind you, the glacier surface is strewn with razor-sharp flints and scree -- the real variety this time -- so that things only got slippery in the late afternoon.
A look up at Eggishorn (I think). Someone's pack is resting on the ice.

Waiting for Spencer to get ready after Installation 1/1 on the glacier. We all got dressed again in between takes. Despite the sun it would have got too cold as there was a breeze blowing chilly down the ice.I was fascinated by the play of light and shadow, dirt and ice and melting water finding a way down and carving out the beginning of a new crevasse. Being part of a photo shoot like this means you spend quite a bit of time just waiting. We had all got dressed again and picked up all our gear. Instructions hadn't been too clear just then and we thought we had to relocate to another place for the next take. But they sent us back to where we had deposited our gear out of the frame. An opportunity to take a sneak shot of the crowd -- less than one fifth of it as the crevasses made it impossible for us to all be in one big group.

It's all over. I decided not to make a mad dash for a five-o'clock cablecar but to stay for the very last Installation ...

(see Greenpeace photo below). (Click on photo for larger view; bottom left you should see ant-sized human figures --

this scenery is fit for giants.)

... and made it safely off the by then rather slippery side of the glacier and up the steep, smooth rocks toward Maerjelensee. A mythical, mystical, mysterious place until quite recently regularly covered by ice and snow, only revealing itself occasionally. Now its clear waters are rimmed by bobbing tufts of Scheuchzer's cotton grass. In fact, the Maerjelen valley has at least three little mountain lakes, all with their cotton grass embroidery. Magical!
From there it was a fairly strenuous and brisk but straightforward 90-minute walk up to the Gletscherstube (the Glacier Room) -- no glacier anywhere in sight now ... ... through the dimness and cool moisture of the Vordersee reservoir service tunnel (was I glad to be out of the heat and the sun for a bit!), out the other end ...... back into the heat and glare of an August summer afternoon near Obers Taelli (the Upper Valley) ...
-- where a cluster of stone mountain huts looks a lot ...... like the ruins of blackhouses abandoned by Scottish peasants cleared off their land in the late 17th/early 18th century by greedy English landowners who found sheep to be more profitable than humans. Shame! --
and on to the final leg of this walk, a fairly steep, knee-ruining walk to Fiescheralp.

I arrived in time to catch a cable car laid on specially for the Greenpeace crowd at about 6:10PM, twenty minutes before the very last car of the day.

At Fiesch train station down in the Fiesch valley, there was time to relax in the balmy evening air, finish off the picknicks we brought along and chat with a companion, exchanging what was already becoming a memory -- but one of the best, most amazing memories anyone can have.

The train journey home was uneventful, lazy, long but not boring because I spent it in the company of two women who, like me, had chosen to embark on this adventure by themselves. I greet you, Gisela and Heidi. I hope you both got home safely, and wish you happiness!

Here's hoping the world will take notice and DO SOMETHING about global warming and climate change and pollution and waste and poverty and injustice and human rights abuses -- they all go hand in hand.

Peace!

PS: It was a long day, from when I locked my door just before 7AM to when I unlocked it again just after 10PM yesterday. As this Sunday ends, I still feel exhilarated, a bit sore in various places, my knees especially, but absolutely determined to do this kind of hard walking a lot more often. Happy to note that I managed to keep up with people much younger than I and much better trained. Looks like daily bike rides, running up and down stairs at home and the odd swim in the river have kept me fairly fit. Bodes well for my walking and sailing plans in Scotland next summer.

***

Official pix at http://www.greenpeace.ch/tunickglacier/ , which is where I found this one, of the fourth and last living installation (©Greenpeace/
The fourth head from the left, at bottom, is mine. I can tell because I was asked to pull up my right knee to offer as a cushion to the woman next to me. Yes, it was cold, yes, it was uncomfortable and yes, it was absolutely exhilarating, moving, wonderful. I'd do it again, any day!

There are a couple of great little videos of the "Glacier Photo Shoot" at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuY7hHJdhCQ&NR=1 (duration 0:1:37 - it was tough negotiating these huge boulders barefoot; I think one or two people were actually really lucky not to get hurt when rocks shifted under their weight -- rest assured: Greenpeace was really well organized and had first-aid crews on hand at all times. I felt completely safe!)
and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOikDujAdTc&NR=1 (duration 0:1:45 -- at ca. 0:45 you can see the installation shown above being set up; a Greenpeace helper is shifting the tiny insulating pad under my hips and me shifting my arm to rest on my hip. This was actually the very last installation we did, and the group had shrunk because many people had had to go catch one of two cable cars back down into the valley, which were a good 1.5 hour walk away).

Thank you, Greenpeace, thank you, Spencer Tunick, for a marvellous day!