Excursion

On the fifth day after the official start on Wednesday morning the excursion to the glaciers of the Ötztaler Alps was scheduled. This formed a welcome diversion after four days of lectures, exercises and computer projects. And what, after all, is the point of being a glaciologist without ever going to see a real glacier?

On the day of the excursion we were allowed to sleep in for an hour, as it turned out, to prepare ourselves to what was coming. At half past nine we set off to Kurzras where the cable car would bring us up to as high as 3211 meters. All the available cars were filled up as much as possible and the rest of the participants took the bus. Unfortunately the bus was running behind schedule and gave us a considerable delay.
At the top station of the cable car we first had a look at some informative glacier panels. After that we descended into the small Ötzi museum of Hotel Grawand. Their we learned all there is to know about this very old ice man including his cause of death, his presumed way of living and how he came to be so well preserved after his death about 5000 years ago. New discoveries are still being made, which according to Adrian results in a longer speech every year. We have to thank Willy for his translation/interpretation.

Paul Grüner (the only one to bring his crampons - "you are only tourists, if you fall in that doesn't matter, but I am a local, I should know") led us down the Hochjochferner, leaving the few skiers somewhat appalled by the devastation that 40 glaciologists on foot bring to a gently skiing slope. Most of the glacier was snow free and Paul showed us the great retreat of the glacier in the 21 years that he is the chef of the Bella Vista refuge. In the mountain refuge an enormous lunch was waiting for us, existing of goat meat with the one and only knödel, lassanga and pasta. Delicious real mountaineering food, we all agreed.

In the (late) afternoon, the excursion took us further up to Im hintern Eis, from where we had a perfect view on the Hintereisferner just below the clouds that had come in. Due to the fact we were running out of time the group split up. The ones that felt like speeding up followed Willy south west across the ridge separating Austria and Italy. From there he explained all about the still ongoing measurements on the Hintereisferner, where to snowline ought to be if the glacier is in equilibrium (this year was a bad year for Hintereisferner) and after some careful searching we saw the hut that was build for the research. Then a knee wrecking descend straight down the mountain brought us from the ridge back to Kurzras.
The other group took it little more relaxed. They got the same explanations on Hintereisferner from Jakob, descended back to Kurzras by the path. Of course not forgetting to stop by the Bella Vista refuge for a beer and an Apfelstrudl. The two groups joined in Karthaus just in time for the well deserved diner.

Some of the photos are available on the picture page.