Born and brought up mainly in the plains of North India, my geographical vocabulary is meagre. The feeling of being at the toe of a glacier is a thousand times more awe-inspiring than looking at its picture. The expansive agelessness of it! It goes back thousands of years, slowly and steadily, giving. It makes me feel small, as I am reminded of the angst on the railway platforms in London when the 7.12 is delayed by 4 minutes. Time adorns a different cape in the white light of the glaciers.

The debris revealed on the sides and the toe of a glacier as it recedes forms landmasses called (lateral and terminal respectively) moraines.  Often there is a bowl of icy water in the centre as if artfully crafted by a deft potter.

The glaciers have their own weather system. A breeze blows downhill over them cooled by the icefield. It is denser and heavier than the air it replaces. These winds have the staccato name of ‘katabatic’ winds.

The Athabasca Glacier spills from the Columbia Icefield, flowing over three giant bedrock steps like a massive slow-moving waterfall. Although glacial ice is solid, it deforms and flows under pressure, moving like a thick pudding. Gravity and the weight of the ice pulls it downhill towards the valley.

And the valley offers splendour and beauty in abundance.