We went ICE CLIMBING on the Matanuska Glacier in ALASKA!

I can't tell if I'm crying a little bit because of the sun or because I'm just scared out of my mind right now. I did it! There are over a hundred thousand glaciers here in Alaska with around 660 of them being named and today we are visiting our first glacier in Alaska, the Matanuska Glacier. This glacier is located about two hours from Anchorage and at 27 miles long it is the largest glacier in the U.S. And instead of just looking at the glacier or even just walking on it, we're going to be doing something we've never done before. We're going ice climbing. But don't worry, we're not going by ourselves. We booked a tour with Micah Guides and they're going to one, teach us how to actually ice climb and then also make sure we stay safe. This is probably the number one thing I wanted to do here in Alaska so I am so pumped for today. You can view the glacier from the highway but to go on the glacier you have to have a guide. There are a variety of tours you can choose from but our ice climbing tour was $225 per person which is definitely our biggest splurge here in Alaska but I know it's going to be totally worth it. All right these are our two guides for the day, Warren and Levi and we actually are the only two people on this tour so we basically have a private tour and two guides. Oh gosh, mosquito. We are so freaking pumped. Our tour is about eight hours with about three to four hours of actual climbing. We just bussed out here to the toe of the glacier and we have about a two mile walk till we get to the actual climbing spots. This is insane. It's unlike any place we've ever been. We're about to start hiking on the moraine which feels like another planet. It's just really rocky. You can hear it like creaking and cracking just under your feet as it's I guess it's melting away. This is just unreal. This is so beautiful. I truly feel like we're walking on the moon right now. Yeah, got the moon landscape then you've got the glacier there and then you've got green mountains in the back. Quite the contrast. First we'll head over like this direction for our first climb to the day. Get you guys warmed up, feeling good. Then we're going to take a nice hike around back towards the icefall and drop you into those crevasses. Sick. All right. We are walking in a glacial canyon with like a river rushing through it and waterfalls. No big deal, just glacial canyon area. Yeah. All that hiking out here got us a little warmed up, got us sweaty, ready to go to climb. I am a little, a little nervous. Climbing isn't my favorite thing to do but it's going to be fun and I'm just super excited for it. We both have a little bit of fear of heights in kind of different ways but this is definitely going to be out of our comfort zone. But that's why we wanted to do it because we wanted to do something here in Alaska that really we couldn't do in many other places and something we've never done before. So I think we're going to be able to work through that fear a little bit and this is going to be just so much fun. I mean even just to walk out here, that's not even what we're paying to do. We're paying to ice climb but even just to walk out here was worth every single penny. Ice climbing is all about your feet. Feet, feet, or defeat. So we've got these sweet front points right here and then you have these secondary points on the back and you want to engage that. We've got these mountain boots that have a shank in them so that as you stab in you can make a nice flat step. What that looks like, kicking in, stepping up, kicking in, and these are your superpowers. Nice wide stance. You should be about shoulder width apart for balance and lean forward and stand up. Stand on it. You got it. Oh yeah. So did you feel your foot kind of pop out? So re-kick it but again try to keep it on that nice horizontal plane. So that is how I want your foot to stay. Looks good. I'm going first. My first time ever ice climbing. I have to get all the way up there. This is so hard. Okay I'll get this. I'll get this. I'm crushing it over here. I can do hard things. I can't tell if I'm crying a little bit because of the sun or because I'm just scared out of my mind right now. I made it down onto solid ground. That is a workout. My legs were shaking so bad. I was beyond nervous but I'm gonna slowly build some confidence and I'll be crushing these ice walls soon. Crushing all the ice walls. The entire glacier. The glacier doesn't stand a chance. Really graceful ending. He sticks the landing. I feel like I got eased into it. I kind of got maybe the thing that I was most scared about out of the way at first. I just had to jump straight into it. So now going up maybe be a little easier. Adam came down first because he basically crawled kind of climbed up to the top so he could film me going up. So instead of him kind of having to hike back down he just kind of elevatored back down and now he gets to go up again and then back down again. Now you're starting to feel that rhythm. Yeah. That routine kick kick swing. You made it. I made it. I wasn't so bad. I was fully expecting to freak out. I freaked out. For our next climb we're going up this bad boy which looks shorter than the last one but it does look steeper but I'm gonna try to just channel my inner confidence. I've been watching Warren and Levi just to see how they do it and I'm feeling a little bit better. I'm gonna do better this time. I went into that thinking I would do much better than I did but I did it. I made it to the top. It wasn't pretty. It was a little scary. A lot scary but I did it and Levi how hard do you think this is? This is pro ice climber grade. Straight up. Like water ice 5. 4 plus frozen waterfall standards. This is gnarly. I don't fully know what that means but they're making it seem like it's really intense so I'm proud of myself for getting up here. Now it's Adam's turn and he crushed the last one so I think he'll crush this one too. How's it feel? Great. You're a natural babe. Yep. Nicely done. Way to go. Can't believe I just accomplished that. I think I purposely didn't look too much into this before we came out here because I didn't want to like psych myself out so if I would have seen that I would have been doing that before we came I probably would have had more trouble but wow that's like exhilarating. We're taking a little break for lunch while they set up the next climbing route and you can actually buy a quinoa bowl from them that you can bring out here for lunch but we just brought some little bagel sandwiches for ourselves. We are eating lunch on top of a glacier that we climbed onto. It does not get any cooler than this literally because we're kind of sitting on ice. Our butts are cold. Oh no I have the hiccups. That is the best I have felt the entire day. I did slip at the beginning and I've slipped every single time and kind of fallen a bit but I've always felt very safe with the ropes and the carabiner and just having Warren and Levi looking out for me. They have been so encouraging and supportive and helpful but man that was the best one for sure and it doesn't hurt that I was basically climbing down into a slot canyon a glacial slot canyon with the most beautiful glacial water in a waterfall. Yeah that was so much fun. Today has been a day of many many emotions but I have the biggest smile on my face right now that I just cannot wipe off. You can't come on a glacier and not drink the water. Best water I've ever had that's so good. Oh yeah That is fresh to death. Oh that's so good. That's nice Our favorite thing we have ever done on our adventures that was just too much fun. It was also the hardest thing we've ever done on our adventures and for me probably the scariest thing we've ever done on our adventures. Me too. I said a lot of bad words. There were some tears I think partially because sunscreen got in my eye. We'll just go with that. Also I think I was just a little nervous at times. I was so out of my comfort zone. I had never done anything like this before but I loved getting to kind of just test myself and like grow and learn a new skill and build some confidence and our guides were super encouraging and helped me every step of the way. So even with some slight cursing and moments where I was very very scared it was still just an incredible experience and yeah we could not recommend this more. Yeah I really surprised myself. Normally I'm pretty scared of a little bit of heights but I don't know what was going on this morning. I just felt very calm. I guess I had a zen attitude going in. I don't know if it was a special day or if like the guides just were had a nice vibe going and uh yeah I don't know. I just felt very confident in like the pick and like my feet and I just had a blast out there. You crushed it. I was so shocked by how great Adam did. I was shocked myself. I just felt comfortable. That was weird. I'm not gonna hide it. I struggled but I definitely got better towards the end but if you think this looked a little too intense for you there are definitely other options. You have to come to the Matanuska Glacier and definitely work with Mica Guides. Oh such an amazing company and the guides were amazing but they definitely have some easier options if this looked too intense because we're not gonna sugarcoat it. Yeah. This is not for everyone. The guides just know so much not only about climbing and safety and stuff but the glacier. They're just like hitting you with facts all day long just blowing your mind again about how cool this place is. We got very lucky that we basically got a private tour that was not planned. We just lucked out that no one else booked this time slot today. We got more one-on-one attention and more help and I think since there was a smaller group of us we were able to do more and check out some cooler spots that maybe you couldn't go to. Basically like a tailored like VIP experience. It was cool. We could go on and on. It was just such an incredible experience and we highly highly recommend it whether you just go walk on a glacier here or you do the climbing. Definitely come and do this. I have a feeling it's going to be really hard to top this here in Alaska but if you're wondering where Kona was this whole time she actually was being boarded in Anchorage because we were just going to be gone too long today so we're going to head back towards that way to go pick her up and then our plan is to do three pretty incredible hikes in the Anchorage area and then from here on out like I think it's just gonna it may not top glacier ice climbing but it's just gonna keep being super epic. Yeah this was might be the most intrepid adventurous thing we do but the rest is still gonna be the stoke level is high. Yeah I feel like this was the start of like the stuff we've been most excited about so we can't wait. I know this is so, it's awkward.