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The Glacier Ride
Glacier Pingo |
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Next morning the low cloud of the previous evening had lifted to reveal the awesome sight of Pingo Glacier; a wall of ice which appeared to hover in the sky some distance ahead of us. We rode through the forest trail, ducking our heads under low hanging branches, splashing through rivers, the glacier getting closer and closer. A vertical wall of ice, jagged peaks and deep crevasses, the glacier twisted its way between 2 mountains like a huge white motorway. A steep bank lay ahead of us and we pushed our horses into a canter up and on reaching the top a lake of blue icebergs confronted us and beyond them the wall of the glacier . There was a frantic scrambling of activity, cameras were retrieved from the bottoms of saddle bags, horses and riders took it in turns to pose at the lakeside. For some illogical reason we felt a sense of urgency, as if the glacier that had been there for thousands of years was going to suddenly melt away before our very eyes and we had to capture it on film as proof that it had existed. After about 15 minutes we calmed down, and Chichen produced a tin cup full of Scotch Whisky with a chunk of ice-berg. That night we camped again at Rio Serrano. I washed my hair using a coffee pot to get water from the river. It was so cold I thought my head was going to drop off! Three condors flew overhead, and noisy green parakeets and a 'gang' of Kara-Kara maintained a constant presence around our camp. I didn't think the trip could get better or the scenery more spectacular, but it did. |
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