The shear volume and size of the glaciers in Antarctic can't help but impress even the most jaded person! For a geologist (and no doubt, glaciologists), this is paradise! Wherever you are in the Peninsula, you will hear these slow-moving rivers of ice creaking and groaning as they inch their way downhill. Every now and then a pistol shot of breaking ice will snap through the air around you, and if lucky, you will hear a fragment of broken glacier falling - either as an avalanche or into water.

Short but deep glaciers...
Wilhemina Bay

Look closely... Clouds can cover the mountains of the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula, usually to 50-100m above sea level. Despite dramatic glacial ice cliffs, they are short glaciers. The ice within the glaciers is probably no more than a few 100 years old, although the glacier may have existed for several 1000 years.

Sunset over tidewater glaciers
Wiencke Island

Frequently large flat dome-shaped glaciers cover large areas - and sometimes entire islands. For snow to build up, it needs to rest on land. The average depth of sea ice at the north pole is about 7m because there is no land beneath the north polar ocean. However, in Antarctica, the snow can accumulate to several kilometers depth on the continental land mass. In the Antarctic Peninsula, the glaciers are rarely more than several 10s of meters thick.

Glacier waterfalls
Anvers Island

The western side of the Antarctic Peninsula doesn't have any ice shelves north of Marguerite Bay. Instead, thick island-covering glaciers and numerous valley/alpine glaciers tumble down the steep cliffs into the ocean.

Glacier putting on an amused face
Neko Harbour

Nature creating art? From this angle, ice carving from the glacier at the waters edge has created (for a brief moment in time) a facade of a bug-eyed face in the ice!

Crevasses in glacier
Neko Harbour

From a distance, the size and white smoothness of glaciers looks like a skiers paradise. However, a close inspection reveals the glaciers of the Antarctic Peninsula are riddled with deep crevasses.