At the Grossglockner Glacier

Wednesday 16 August 2000. We have reached the highest point that our coach can get in the High Alpine Pass. It's minus four degrees centigrade, but strangely it doesn't feel all that cold. We went out in T-shirts and were comfortable enough without having to put on the jackets that we carried just in case.

We had hoped to catch a glimpse of edelweiss, but it was too early in the season. Up we climbed, past the final and highest car park and, leaning over the railings, we saw the glacier below us.

There was even a funicular that you could ride to take you down to the glacier surface. We opted to stay up on the road though, we weren't wearing suitable footwear for prancing about on ice.

Glaciers flow like water. Just very, very slowly. And whilst they are doing that, over the years they break off and pick up lots of tiny bits of rock and end up looking more muddy than ice. Just the very top of the glacier was approaching white.

It looked like tunnels had been bored into the side of the glacier so that you could go inside it to get a feel for the chill of the place...

I had brought a telephoto lens for the camera These were the days where I was experimenting with digital which was only in its infancy and today was important enough for me to have my SLR film camera with me. I could see that down in the cracks in the glacier the ice shone with that wonderful turquoise colour.

Having gone down the funicular, people are now climbing up a series of around 30 steps to reach the edge of the glacier. One or two from our party made it down.

We carried on walking up the road until it petered out in a cluster of buildings, bars, shops and restaurants.

We found a souvenir shop! Yodelling teddy bear anyone? Miss Franny? She turns quickly with a guilty look. Have you been sniffing the Schnapps bottles again Miss Franny?

I simply can't make up my mind which of these Tyrolean hats suit me the best... We are 7,500 feet above the level of our home. It is minus four degrees centigrade. We are dressed in T-shirts with bare arms. We buy ice cream...

Outside a helicopter is buzzing to and fro across the mountainside, the crew scanning the larger crevices on the off chance someone might have fallen down one. Actually that would be extremely scary - some of those crevices are very deep! It's time to return to the coach before a crevice comes for me...

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The High Alpine Road to Grossglockner

Wednesday 19 August 2003. We are on a coach, heading for the Grossglockner glacier.

This is the morning coffee stop, already high up in the mountains, but without a great deal of snow...

Mum has recovered from her bit of sunstroke and is carrying a cardigan today, though she says it's too hot to put on.

The view opposite the roadside cafe. Tumbling waterfalls. The locals say all the snow has melted, leaving only the permafrost ice on the high peaks.

Fran and I have been to the glacier before and we are shocked when we see it. It seems a lot smaller than it was in 2000.

Grossglockner peaks at 3,798 metres (12,461 ft) above sea level - this being measured against the level of the Adriatic Sea. It's the highest mountain in Austria and the highest in the Alps east of the Brenner Pass. From it's peak you can see for 140 miles or 150 miles if you count atmospheric refraction. Personally I've made it a habit not to count atmospheric refraction... Anyway it's high up. The views to north, south, east and west reach as far as places I've never heard of in my life... It is the second largest mountain in the Alps (to Mont Blanc) when measured from peak to the foot of the mountain.

So... having come up, we'd better go down again. The covered road on the left of the photo is a protection against avalanches. The meltwater from the glacier is trapped in a dam on the far side of the lake, from where it runs down a gully that remained hidden from the road into the reservoir.

Back down the hairpin bends we go, swaying merrily from side to side, looking at times down long vertical drops!

Return to Austrian Tyrol Index 2003

The High Alpine Road

After the entry on the Grossglockner Glacier someone said they wanted to see the road and its hairpin bends so here are a couple of shots showing just a taste of the spectacular scenery there is on the High Alpine Pass to Grossglockner.

We were on coach trips each time we've been to Austria and at times the coach was filled with the sound of "Ooooh!" sometimes in awe and sometimes in terror!

The glacier ends when the ice breaks up and melts, resulting in a river of glacial water that feeds a high dammed reservoir of cool turquoise water. The colour of glacial water has to be seen to be believed, it is the most beautiful of colours.

Water from the reservoir and other meltwaters cascade down the mountainside in streams, cascades and sometimes giant falls of water, visible from far away.

The memories stirred by writing about that holiday made me want to go again as it's a few years since we were there and I'd enjoy a holiday in the Tirol again. We've stayed in Mariastein and Niederau, but my favourite was the first trip we took to Austria when we stayed in Schuttdorf, just 15 minutes walk from the lovely Zell-am-See.

Large Versions of the Photos: hairpin bends (a wider view), mountain scenery

Grossglockner Glacier

As we were talking about Austria a couple of posts ago and seeing as my web pages on our Austrian holidays have gone bye bye, I was nudged to follow the entry on Krimml Falls with a memory of Grossglockner Glacier.

We've visited it twice,on 16 August 2000 and again on 13 August 2003 when we thought it was somewhat diminished in size from our previous trip.

The High Alpine Road that you must take to reach the glacier is one of those spectacular car-advert type of roads with series of S-bend hairpins winding their way up the mountains, gorgeous scenery and views of distant waterfalls, cascading immense vertical distances. It's well worth a trip!

The Austrian Marmot is much in evidence at Grossglockner too. Larger than praire marmots, they have a liking for bread that we took advantage of on our first trip, though by the second there were notices asking visitors not to feed the marmots who were by now sitting around looking up at the roadway expectantly and muttering amongst themselves; "Are they not going to chuck us anything to eat? I'm dying for a good butty!"

You can climb down to stand on the glacier but we didn't. In fact there's a funicular railway to take you part of the way down. Fran decided that the souvenir shop was a better bet...

Larger Versions of the Photos: the glacier, marmots