Shortly after we arrived here we headed out to find Knik Glacier, little did we know, you can’t get to it from Knik Glacier Rd. Who would of thought that. Well, now that we know better, I’ve researched the area and found you can get to it from the other side of the Knik River. This area is part of The Knik River Public Use Area I’ve been going to the past few days. Only today, I headed further over into the town of Butte, from there, you can hit trails to get to the Knik River. Wow are there some trails back there, looks like it will be fun come summer. Anyway, I drove down the trail that ended up at the Knik River, what a wonderful view from there, the river, mountains, and of course, the Knik Glacier. The Glacier almost looked like you could reach out and touch it, though I know it is still a long ways off. After letting the dogs run for a bit, I headed further down the main trail, I stopped at a point in the river, took a couple more photos, then turned around to head back home. The trail looked like it went on for a long ways, another day I’ll follow it futher.
In the following pictures of the glacier, the small green/brown strip that is in front of the glacier, well, those are trees. Not grass, brush, shrubs, but trees. It shows how large the Knik Glacier really is.
The Knik Glacier averages about 200 feet thick. Its face is about three miles wide at the head of Knik River, this is what you are seeing in my photos, the face.
Bit of history: Before the great earthquake of 1964, Knik Glacier used to seal off Lake George Gorge causing Lake George to form. Each spring, the water would erode the glacier ice dam and as much as 150 million gallons of water per minute would begin to pour through the gorge, at times forming a wall of water 150 feet high.
Photos from today…
Knik Glacier
Image at 1680
Views from around the river
Image at 1680
Looking down river to the train bridge
While I was there, the sun went behind Pioneer Peak for a bit
Image at 1680
To finish things off, here is a panorama of the area.
Just Plain Big
And, one last photo. One of the birds that come by the house, Bohemian Waxwing
’til next time
Laters
Ed
