Archive for Sydney Hedberg
The Art of Glaciers
Today was a truly liberal arts experience. We spent the morning thinking about proposed solutions to slow glacial melt and climate change, and got to see some firsthand. On the Vadre Pers Glacier, we saw one method of slowing glacial melt: covering the glacier with a white, insulating blanket. This helps to slow glacier melt […]
A Hikin’ Good Time
We woke up on Thursday morning to a standard, but yummy, breakfast of fresh bread, yogurt and some good Switzerland cheeses. With full bellies, we set out to town to catch the gondola for a hike. This was the oldest gondola in Grindelwald, complete with polka music playing in the gondola on our way up. […]
A Day in the History of the Mountaineers
In the morning, we visited the Matterhorn Museum in Zermatt, Switzerland. This museum gave us insight into early life in Zermatt as well as how tourism and mountaineering has shaped the community in recent decades. Zermatt is home to one of the most technically challenging mountains in the European Alps, the Matterhorn. The first climbers […]
“That’s a honkin’ big hunk’a ice”
Our main activity of the day was descending into a valley to reach the Mer de Glace glacier, and entering an ice cave that had been carved out into the glacier. One of the most astonishing things about our first up close and personal interaction with the glacier was the almost incomprehensible rate of melting […]