Vatnajökull National Park , Ice Climbing and exploring South Iceland (Day7)
This was the BIGGEST and MOST adventure filled day for the both of us - we were going ice climbing. After doing it in Alaska just a few years back, we know we are addicted to ice climbing and so we were super excited. But S had not been feeling her 100%, so she was a little nervous and anxious about doing the long hike and climb.
We were scheduled to meet the guide (and others who were going to be in our team that day) from Arctic Adventures at 9 am at Skaftafell Basecamp, located in front of the Vatnajökull National Park’s Skaftafellsstofa visitor center. We had signed up for the Glacier Extreme circuit, where it involved not only hiking on ice but proper ice climbing. The whole trip was for a total of 8 hours.
We packed up our stuff and left the Hoff cottages early in order to start the trip after checking in and filling out all the paperwork. After a short briefing on the tour and safety rules – they make sure that the adventurers are both informed and well-prepared, we got equipped with hard hats, picked up ice axes and were fitted with ice climbing shoes and harnesses. We felt like ice-crushing superheroes - a true explorer!
Getting all set up, we took a bus from the basecamp and were dropped off at the location from where we would start hiking. We hiked for about 20-25 minutes on gravel terrain until we came to the location where we sat down in a circle to put on the ice crampons and wore our hard hats for the rest of the journey. There were 4 more people in our group excluding the guide.
After walking for about 10-15 more minutes up a steep wall through creeks and all, we finally got to the main glacier. Along the way, we were greeted by vibrant ice giants and mysterious moulins that plunged deep into the glacier. It was a load of fun posing, photographing and walking on ice. No matter how experienced you are, it always takes a little getting used to as you first start. It was just about 11.30 am when we finally began our hike. That's when we started to continue our hike to get to the part where we would climb the ice wall in front of us. At first, we did some practice climbing - how to properly land the ice ax and how to make sure that our boots and crampons grip properly so that we can launch our ascent.
At first it was great, but the full ascent was kind of hard for S. Even though she was full of excitement, her energy level was low from being somewhat under the weather. So after climbing the first wall, we decided not to continue the circuit and not do the next strenuous ascent and descent. We consulted our guide and instead descended down to continue with a different group who were doing the Glacier Explorer hike - that would let us at least enjoy the beauty of the glacier. S was very sad and disappointed with herself, but R tried to cheer her up and convinced her that we would soon be back another day to complete the Glacier Extreme circuit.
It was close to 3.30 pm when we got back to the area where the bus picked us up again and whisked us away to return to the Arctic Adventures Skaftafell Basecamp. And after returning all the equipment, we made our way to Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon and spent our evening there till past sunset.
Eventually we made our hour-long drive to Fosshotel Vatnajökull, a charismatic and attractive hotel in the southeast of Iceland with a spectacular panoramic view of the majestic glacier Vatnajökull and reached there at 10 pm. After having a delicious dinner, we decided to step out in search of auroras since the prediction was quite high at that time. But unfortunately, the cloud cover was heavy too, so after spending an hour outside, we returned to the hotel and called it a night!
