Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.02.2019, Blaðsíða 48

48 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 02— 2019
It’s a rare occurrence to see relics of
the past untainted by the present. The
trenches of World War I have long since
been covered in wildflowers. The east
side of the Berlin Wall riddled in graf-
fiti. The Terracotta Army oxidised to a
dull grey. A glacier remains, perhaps,
the only perfect record of times long
gone. Each layer, compressed unfath-
omably tight, provides an untouched
reconstruction of the time it last glis-
tened under the sunlight. In each bub-
ble, a microcosm of a past atmosphere
forms. In each dark layer, a sprinkling
of tephra tells the story of a volcanic
eruption long-forgotten. It’s through
glaciers that scientists, like leafing
through the pages of a book, have pored
over the eons of the Earth.
Snow and sleet
But the idea of traversing the millennia
of Iceland’s geology was, to be blunt,
far from my mind as I set off to the
Mýrdalsjökull glacier early one Friday
morning. I was very much stuck in the
present, fiddling with my coat, worried
as I watched the sky hurl sleet and snow
down onto the windshield as we trav-
elled southwards on Route One.
Our destination was the Katla ice cave.
As we turned into Vík, which was en-
gulfed by fog, it seemed like weather
was conspiring against our glacier
hike. Arriving early, I huddled in the
car, desperately hoping for some sun-
light to emerge.
The abyss beckons
Buried deep within the Mýrdalsjökull
glacier, Katla is one of the most ac-
tive volcanoes in the country, having
erupted, on average, every 50 years—
the last time being in 1918. As we
boarded the Super Jeep that would
drive us to the cave this reality hit me.
We were walking onto a time bomb.
But Hákon, our guide, laughed off
such concerns. I chose to follow his
lead and face the void head on.
As we turned onto the glacier, the
clouds parted fatefully, lighting up
the sky. While I’ve seen my fair share
of glaciers, their stupefying expanse
never fails to take my breath away.
The sunlight reflected off the pris-
tine snow and the remnants of fog
coalesced with the sunlight, forming
an all-engulfing white abyss. There
was no ground, no sky, just an endless
expanse of white with one Super Jeep
crawling slowly through it.
A marble tomb
It didn’t take long to come within
view of the ice cave. Clumsily put-
ting on our crampons in the calf-
deep snow, we trudged towards Katla.
From afar, the entrance resembled a
black smudge on a white canvas, but
as we advanced, it assumed a mysti-
cal quality.
Surrounded by imposing black and
blue ice, entering the glacier felt like
tiptoeing into a marble tomb. Cold
and ominously dark, with grandiose
icicles adorning the walls, it was hard
to imagine that this cave had formed
naturally, and wasn’t the lair of a
supervillain. Despite being a small
space, the cave’s high arches made
it feel airy, and the dark heavy walls,
regal. I looked up and followed the
dripping of an icicle to an overhang-
ing wall, and it was in this moment
that I realised something significant
had slipped under my radar.
Rife with bubbles
The deep ice contained layers upon
layers, some dark and foggy, some
rife with bubbles, and some without.
Each one contained years of history.
I wondered what the temperature one
milky seam had been the day this
snow fell. Above all that was a jagged
sheet of blue—was it windy, when
it formed? In some areas, tectonic
stress had moved the layers perpen-
dicular to the ground. Sharp cracks
made others appear uneven. Near
the top was a sharp black slab. Was
this the most recent Eyjafjallajökull
eruption? I couldn’t understand the
language, but the pages of the gla-
cier’s memoir were right in front of
my eyes.
Calling me back to reality, Hákon
motioned to a low entrance in the
snow beyond. “That’s next year’s
cave,” he said. With each season, he
explained, the caves melt and reform.
Therefore, each year the Katla ice cave
changes, revealing new parts while
concealing others. The walls of last
year told a different story than the
walls of this year, and so on. And as
the ice continues to accumulate and
melt, new chapters wait to be written.
Distance from
Reykjavík:
160km
How to get there:
Route One South,
turn left onto
Route 222 and
drive to the end of
the road
Trip provided by:
Arcanum Glacier
Tours—book at
mountainguides.is
Writing On
The Walls
Of Ice

History reveals itself in the Mýrdalsjökull ice cave
Words : Hannah Jane Cohen Photos: Art Bicnick
“Though
I couldn’t
understand
the language,
the pages of
the glacier’s
memoir were
right in front
of my eyes.”
Entering the icy voidBoarding the Super Jeep Hákon says relax