03 Nov Glaciers in Black and White
It was the fourth day of my Mt Rainier National Park backpacking trip. As I sipped my coffee at the Yellowstone Cliffs campground, I studied the topo map to reacquaint myself with our hike for the day. We were to pass the Carbon Glacier, which sounded cool, but I was too preoccupied in the moment with the number of miles to be covered to give the glacier much thought. I’d arrived in camp the night before on the verge of tears, my toes in excruciating pain from ill-fitting boots made worse by the steep decline at the end of the day’s hike. My toenail was already turning purple and the idea of hiking nearly nine miles, our longest hike yet, with a 50-pound pack and bad boots over what promised to be even steeper terrain made me cringe. I’d seen glaciers before and the decision as to whether to switch to my camp sandals and risk a twisted ankle or subject my toe to further torture seemed far more pressing.
I decided to ditch the boots, ultimately forever. One of my first post-mountain tasks was to return the evil shoes to REI, presenting my black toenail (which fell off several weeks later) as evidence of their shortcomings.
With my feet happily unconstrained in their sandals and the dreaded switchbacks not nearly as dramatic as we’d interpreted on the map, I was ready to give the glacier my full attention by the time we emerged from the forest. I suspect it would’ve commanded my full attention regardless – This was like no glacier I’d seen before. It sparkled in the sunlight as expected but instead of bluish-white, it was jet black. I stopped and stared, pulling up my sunglasses for an unfiltered view and confirming that it was black as coal. I wondered whether this was where the name Carbon Glacier derived. Was there actual carbon in the ice? A ranger we ran into later confessed that he’d never considered this theory, but was pretty sure the black color came from a heavy layer of rock and soil covering the ice. He must be right as I’ve found no alternate explanation.
We worked our way along the outwash plain and stopped for lunch adjacent to the glacier’s terminus. We’d been graced with clear weather and the mid-day sun highlighted the contrast between the black glacier and Mt Rainier’s snow-topped peak against a blue sky, a sky status never to be counted on in this part of the world. As if this weren’t enough of a marvel, I found myself unexpectedly fascinated by being at a river’s source. This wasn’t just watching one body of water join another, or even seeing water trickle from the earth. Here the Carbon River erupted from its namesake glacier, a conversion of black ice to milky water right before our eyes, roaring in our ears. I could see how both the ice and the resulting river had shaped this valley over millennia and understood how it would continue to do so into the unforeseen future. It was humbling to witness nature’s power. Yet today, it’s hard to be in the presence of a glacier and not consider climate change. Were the vast rock beds surrounding the glacier signs of its recession?
Not being a glaciologist and never having seen this glacier before, I was merely speculating but I found myself haunted by climate change thoughts as we hiked along Carbon Glacier most the of day and proceeded to Winthrop Glacier the following day, when our luck with the weather ended. We awoke that morning to the more typical Pacific Northwest fog and rain. We heard the White River roar before we reached its banks. We crossed its raging waters and stopped to stare into the fog, but Winthrop, the source glacier, remained veiled. I saw a few shards of ice on a sandy beach before me, an image that that I recalled at higher elevations when we heard, then saw, torrents of ice cascade from the face of the glacier. Surely sloughing ice was usual in the summer months, but how much? Was this too a sign of climate change?
It saddens me that climate change is now so pervasive that even innocent backpacking trips are tainted by its imposition. But it turns out that the Carbon Glacier has retreated less that other glaciers in the area because of its more shaded position in a deep valley on the north side of the mountain, and by that thick insulating layer of soil and rock. I’m encouraged that at least one glacier, and it’s a very cool glacier, is resisting the change!
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