Hiking Exit Glacier

Alaska Travelog #17
Kenai Fjords National Park - Mon, 17 Jun 2024, 1:30pm

We have a big hike ahead of us today— to Exit Glacier in Kenai Fjords National Park. Ordinarily this is the sort of thing where we'd get up early in the morning and get going early to make sure there's enough daylight. But with Alaska's ridiculous long summer days, plus being only about 10 miles away, we didn't sweat it. We relaxed in our hotel room while there was a heavy fog this morning then got lunch in town (no, not pizza a fifth time!) before heading into the park.

As we drove up into the park from Seward the fog thinned out. It wasn't so much that the fog was burning off for the day as that it was concentrated around the bay. The cruise crewmember was right yesterday when they called it a convective fog. It's a phenomenon created by warm air over cold water. Ergo, get away from the water and you get away from the fog. By the time we reached the first viewpoint for Exit Glacier we were completely out of the fog.



This is a long-distance view of Exit Glacier. It's the low spot in between those two mountains. The scale can be a bit difficult to understand from a picture... the mountain on the left is just over 4,000' high, the right just over 4,500'. The top of the glacier's ice field, the low part in the middle, is 2400' elevation. And the outwash plain at our feet is 300-400' above sea level.

Exit Glacier wasn't always this small. At the height of the last Ice Age, 23,000 years ago, the glacier covered everything in view, including both mountains. Even 200 years ago the glacier was much bigger than it is today. 200 years ago the foot of the glacier was basically right in front of where I stood for this photo.

But hey, let's get on with the hike!



Well, okay, before we got on with the hike we stopped at the visitors center. We always do that to check conditions, get suggestions on things to watch for or other places to visit, and, of course, to buy hawk and sheep toys if we see any. They only had a scruffy eagle and a small sheep that we already own a bigger version of.



Here we are again on the trail. As you can see in the photo it starts off easily. It's a paved, gently sloped path. This is the "bunny slope" part of the trail that everyone hikes, including the cruise ship tourists who just waddled off the activity bus and are complaining about the lack of a McDonald's in Seward.



Here's another view of the lower part of the trail. I'm pleasantly surprised I found a moment with nobody in the frame.

That "1926" marker in the lower right corner of the photo indicates that just 98 years ago the glacier came down to here. Yeah, today you can't even see the glacier from here. The toe of the glacier is over a mile away and now this spot is a temperate rain forest.

Up next: Up, Up, Up to the Ridge!

The Trail to Exit Glacier and Harding Ice Field

Alaska Travelog #18
Kenai Fjords National Park - Mon, 17 Jun 2024, 4pm

Today we've hiked the trail toward Exit Glacier and the Harding Ice Field in Kenai Fjords National Park. After starting out easily from the visitors center the trail forks in various directions. We took the fork that goes up, up, up.



The climb was... well, I don't want to say tough but it sure wasn't easy. We've climbed about 1,300 vertical feet over the course of 2 miles. That's far from the toughest we've ever done, especially because there's no altitude acclimation challenge here. And the beautiful views in all directions helped us keep focused on the reason for the hike rather than the drudgery of it.



As we climbed ever higher the views opened up more and more. And the sky was so clear. We could see there was still fog hanging over Resurrection Bay in the distance. But out here it was sunny and even warm. I'd stripped off my heavy sweater after 10 minutes of hiking. The little thermometer I clipped on my pack reads 72°. And yes, in the photo above that's a patch of snow in the small trees below us.

Speaking of snow, there'd be more to come.



As we approached Marmot Meadow, which a ranger at the visitors center below advised us is as far as we should go, we crossed a few larger patches of snow.



Marmot Meadow is where we were advised to turn around as going farther involves entering areas with increased snow/ice hazards and danger of avalanches. Indeed we'd already seen a small avalanche happen high up on the snowy cliffs an hour earlier. Such warnings didn't stop a lot of hikers who'd gotten this far. Even we pressed on just a bit further, as long as the trail was dry and clear.



This was the view at our turnaround point. From here the trail drops down the side of the cliff to meet the side of the glacier. We didn't feel like going down only to have to come back up. 😅 But like I said, some other hikers up here did exactly that. Some of them even had the appropriate gear for it. (Our not having crampons and ice axes was one reason we planned not to go further than this.) Indeed, in the photo above you can see a small group of hikers on the glacier. They're just above the crevasse near the bottom center of the picture.

Up next: Coming back down from Exit Glacier

Coming Back Down from Exit Glacier and Harding Ice Field

Alaska Travelog #19
Now getting dinner - Mon, 17 Jun 2024, 7pm

We reached our turnaround point on the trail to the Harding Ice Field just before 4pm. It's not that it was too late in the afternoon to continue; there'd still be more than 7 hours of daylight plus 2 hours of dusk. It's that to go further really would have benefited from snow/ice equipment and we were too exhausted to fake it. So we did the safe thing, the thing recommended by the ranger anyway, and turned back.



The way down on out-and-back trails can become a forgettable thing. You've already seen all the sights, now it's just a matter of putting one foot in front of the other 5,000 times. So it helps to remind oneself, In Beauty I Walk. And it helps when nature is stinkin' beautiful with constant panoramic views.



We do still have to walk those thousands of steps, though, so we can't stop constantly for pictures. Though it does serve a dual purpose of letting us rest our aching legs. 😅



Well, actually, our legs weren't aching while we were still up here. It was about halfway down the relentless descent that our knees and toes were crying out for mercy.

We made it back to our car at 5:45pm and then to town around 6:15. We went straight to dinner.