We went ICE CLIMBING on the Matanuska Glacier in ALASKA!

i can't tell if i'm crying a little bit because of the sun or because i'm just scared out of my mind right [Music] now hi jenna [Music] there are over a hundred thousand glaciers here in alaska with around 660 of them being named and today we are visiting our first glacier in alaska the matanuska glacier this glacier is located about two hours from anchorage and at 27 miles long it is the largest glacier in the u.s that can be reached by vehicle and instead of just looking at the glacier or even just walking on it we're going to be doing something we've never done before we're going ice climbing but don't worry we're not going by ourselves we booked a tour with micah guides and they're gonna one teach us how to actually ice climb and then also make sure we stay safe this is probably the number one thing i wanted to do here in alaska so i am so pumped for today [Music] you can view the glacier from the highway but to actually go on the glacier you have to have a guide there are a variety of tours you can choose from but our ice climbing tour was 225 dollars per person which is definitely our biggest splurge here in alaska but i know it's going to be totally worth it [Music] all right these are our two guys for the day warren and levi and we actually are the only two people on this tour so we basically have a private tour and two guides oh gosh mosquito we are so freaking pumped [Music] [Applause] [Music] our tour is about eight hours with about three to four hours of actual climbing we just bust out here to the toe of the glacier and we have about a two mile walk until we get to actual climbing spots [Music] [Music] this is insane it's unlike any place we've ever been about to start hiking on the moraine which feels like another planet it's just really rocky oh you can hear it like creaking and cracking just under your feet as it's i guess it's melting away this is just unreal [Music] this is so beautiful i truly feel like we're walking on the moon right now yeah got the moon landscape then you've got the glacier there and then you've got green mountains in the back quite the contrast first we'll head over like this direction for our first climb to the day get you guys warmed up feeling good then we're gonna take a nice hike around back towards the ice fall and drop you into those crevasses sick all right [Music] [Applause] [Music] we are walking in a glacial canyon with like a river rushing through it and waterfalls no big deal just delicious [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] all that hiking out here got us a little warmed up got a sweaty ready to go to climb i am a little a little nervous climbing isn't my favorite thing to do but it's going to be fun and i'm just super excited for it we both have a little bit of a fear of heights in kind of different ways but this is definitely going to be out of our comfort zone but that's why we wanted to do it because we wanted to do something here in alaska that really we couldn't do in many other places and something we've never done before so i think we're gonna be able to work through that fear a little bit and this is gonna be just so much fun i mean even just to walk out here that's not even what we're paying to do we're paying to ice climb but even just to walk out here was worth every single penny [Music] ice climbing is all about your feet feet feet or defeat so we've got these sweet front points right here and then you have these secondary points on the back and you want to engage that we've got these mountain boots that have a shank in them so that as you stab in you can make a nice flat step what that looks like kicking in stepping up kicking in and these are your super powers nice wide stance you should be about shoulder width apart for balance and lean forward and stand up stand on it you got it oh yeah so did you feel your foot kind of pop out so re-kick it but again try to keep it on that nice horizontal plane so that is how i want your foot to stay so [Music] boots and crampons look good we'll get you hooked in over here i'm going first my first time ever ice climbing [Music] oh i think it all the way up there this is so hard [Music] okay i'll get this i'll get this i'm crushing it over here i can do hard things [Music] oh [Music] i can't tell if i'm crying a little bit because of the sun or because i'm just scared out of my mind right now i made it down onto solid ground that is a workout my legs were shaking so bad i was beyond nervous but i'm gonna slowly build some confidence and i'll be crushing these ice walls soon crushing all the ice walls the entire glacier the glacier doesn't stand a chance really graceful ending he sticks the landing i feel like i got eased into it i kind of got maybe the thing that i was most scared about out of the way first i just had to jump straight into it so now going up maybe a little easier adam came down first because he basically crawled kind of climbed up to the top so he could feel me going up so instead of him kind of having to hike back down he just kind of elevatored back down and now he has to go up again and then back down again [Music] now you're starting to feel that that rhythm yeah that routine kick kick swing you made it [Music] i was fully expecting to freak out i freaked out for our next climb we're going up this bad boy which looks shorter than the last one but it does look steeper but i'm gonna try to just channel my inner confidence i've been watching warren and levi just to see how they do it and i'm feeling a little bit better i'm gonna do better this time [Music] i went into that thinking i would do much better than i did but i did it i made it to the top it wasn't pretty it was a little scary a lot scary but i did it and levi how hard do you think this is this is pro ice climber grade straight up like water ice five four plus frozen waterfall standards it's this is gnarly i don't fully know what that means but they're making it seem like it's really intense so i'm proud of myself for getting up here now it's adam's turn and he crushed the last one so i think he'll crush this one too how's it feel great it's stronger you're a natural babe yup nicely done way to go can't believe i just accomplished that i think i purposely didn't look too much into this before we came out here because i didn't want to like psych myself out so if i would have seen that i would have been doing that before we came i probably would have had more trouble but wow that's like exhilarating [Music] we're taking a little break for lunch while they set up the next climbing route and you can actually buy a quinoa bowl from them that you can bring out here for lunch but we just brought some little bagel sandwiches for ourselves we are eating lunch on top of a glacier that we climbed onto it does not get any cooler than this literally because we're kind of sitting on ice frozen our butts are cold oh no i have the hiccups [Music] [Music] wow oh my gosh [Music] [Music] [Music] that is the best i have felt the entire day i did slip at the beginning and i've slipped every single time and kind of fallen a bit but i've always felt very safe with the ropes and the carabiner and just having warren and levi looking out for me they have been so encouraging and supportive and helpful but man that was the best one for sure and it doesn't hurt that i was basically climbing down into a slot canyon a glacial slot canyon with the most beautiful glacial water in a waterfall [Music] yeah that was so much fun today has been a day of many many emotions but i have the biggest smile on my face right now that i just cannot wipe off you can't come on a glacier not drink the water best water ever had that's so good oh yeah [Applause] that is fresh to death [Applause] oh that's so good [Music] [Music] that's nice [Music] bye [Music] that was by far our favorite thing we have ever done on our adventures that was just too much fun it was also the hardest thing we've ever done on our adventures and for me probably the scariest thing we've ever done on our adventures i said a lot of bad words there were some tears i think partially because sunscreen got in my eye we'll just go with that also i think i was just a little nervous at times i was so out of my comfort zone i had never done anything like this before but i loved getting to kind of just test myself and like grow and learn a new skill and build some confidence and our guides were super encouraging and helped me every step of the way so even with some slight cursing and moments where i was very very scared it was still just an incredible experience and yeah we could not recommend this more yeah i really surprised myself normally i'm pretty scared of a little bit of heights but i don't know what was going on this morning i just felt very calm i guess i had a zen attitude going in i don't know if it was a special day or if like other guides just were had a nice vibe going and uh yeah i don't know i just felt very confident in like the pick and like my feet and i just had a blast out there he crushed it i was so shocked by how great adam did i shocked myself i just felt comfortable so bad i'm not gonna hide it i struggled but i definitely got better towards the end but if you think this looked a little too intense for you there are definitely other options you have to come to the matanuska glacier and definitely work with mica guides oh such an amazing company and the guides were amazing but they definitely have some easier options if this looked too intense because we're not gonna sugar coat it yeah this is not for everyone the guides just know so much not only about climbing and safety and stuff but the glacier they're just like hitting you with facts all day long just blowing your mind again about how cool this place is we got very lucky that we basically got a private tour that was not planned we just lucked out that no one else booked this time slot today and we got more one-on-one attention and more help and i think since there was a smaller group of us we were able to do more and check out some cooler spots that maybe you couldn't go to basically like a tailored like vip experience it was cool we could go on and on yeah it was just such an incredible experience and we highly highly recommend it whether you just go walk on a glacier here or you do the climbing definitely come and do this i have a feeling it's gonna be really hard to top this here in alaska but if you're wondering where kona was this whole time she actually was being boarded in anchorage because we were just gonna be gone too long today so we're gonna head back towards that way to go pick her up and then our plan is to do three pretty incredible hikes in the anchorage area and then from here on out like i think it's just gonna it may not top glacier ice climbing but it's just gonna keep being super epic yeah this was might be the most intrepid adventurous thing we do but the rest is still gonna be the stoke level is high yeah like this was the start of like the stuff we've been most excited about so we cannot wait know this is awkward [Music] you

Channel: Adventures of A+K

Views: 49,761

Keywords: matanuska glacier, ice climbing, matanuska glacier alaska, mica guides, ice climbing matanuska glacier, matanuska glacier hike, matanuska glacier tour, matanuska glacier tour mica, ice climbing alaska, mica guides alaska, glacier ice climbing, things to do in alaska, what to do in alaska, alaska road trip, travel alaska, visit alaska, alaska travel vlog, ice climbing in alaska, alaska glacier

Id: V3aJicDsjCg

Length: 17min 57sec (1077 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 31 2022