Briksdal Glacier Hike and Evening Fjord Cruising from Olden, Norway

Norway should top the bucket list for anyone interested in climate change.

Walking up to Briksdal Glacier, signposts mark how far it has receded at different points in time over the last 250 years or so, and it is considerable.

There's absolutely no question, in my opinion, that climate warming has resulted in this particular glacier retreating up the mountain.  It can still be seen standing majestically in the distance as you hike up the trail through beautiful foliage, past streams and waterfalls, multi-hued mountainsides and panoramic views looking back across the valley.

Perhaps surprisingly for most people, climate change can be quite gorgeous, as it is in Norway.

Additional CO2 that froze long ago into the glacial ice evaporates into the atmosphere when ice melts, contributing to a greener planet.  Trees and plants need CO2 to grow and flourish.  In exchange, foliage returns oxygen to the world, which is very good for humans.

It was the advance of Briksdal Glacier over thousands of years that purportedly formed the lush, fertile Briksdalen Valley where we hiked.  Tourists have taken advantage of the opportunity to hike to this accessible glacier for over a century.

Briksdal Glacier is the western arm of Jostedalsbre Glacier, the largest glacier in Europe.

According to Princess Patter, "The Jostedalsbreen National Park covers 510  square miles, with the glacier covering about 300 square miles.  Back in 1750, the Jostedalsbre expanded, swallowing up several farms."

The port town of Olden is about three times the size of our prior port, Skjolden, so about 600 residents live there year-round. 

As with Skjolden, Olden is much more pleasing to look at and easier for debarkation than industrial-looking ports where large ships frequently dock.

We had booked Viator's Olden Shore Excursion: the Amazing Briksdal Glacier before leaving home. 

Incidentally, if you do book a Viator excursion, it is important to note that you may cancel until 24 hours before the excursion starts without penalty, but if the ship unexpectedly cancels a port of call when you're already within that final 24 hours, you should not expect a refund.  A surefire alternative would be Shore Excursions Group, which has port protection (with timely notification) built-in, or the cruise line's excursion department.

When we departed the ship, we soon found the company's rep, who took us over to our bus, where our guide awaited.  

The greeter and guide were both attractive, cheerful people, making it a very pleasant welcome.  They were young seasonal workers from the Netherlands who love being in mountain settings far more than cities.

The guide shared interesting information about the area as we drove to the park's trailhead.

Before we departed the bus, she pointed to the trail and the cafeteria as the two main alternatives, instructing those who could make the walk to go all the way to the lake near the glacier, and those who can't to go as far as they could and then retreat to the cafeteria to buy coffee or a snack.  

Julie and I were soon off the bus and on a long uphill trek.

Expecting a guided hike all the way would leave you disappointed.  With such diverse fitness levels, the only logical way for a busload of tourists to take a challenging uphill hike with lots of photo ops is to let people go at their own pace.  We did see our guide at the top and spoke with her a bit, but mostly we were left to enjoy nature on our own.

The sites are lovely all along the way, and if you are in moderately good physical condition, you should be able to hike to the top of the trail without any problem.

I later spoke to one elderly gentleman who said he was disappointed by a similar excursion, because he never knew what he was supposed to do.  His guide had not pointed to the trail and said to stay on it as far as he was physically capable.

A better choice for those who are mobility challenged or simply don't want to invest that much energy would be Troll Cars, which drive up to the glacier from Jostedal Glacier National Park's souvenir shop at the base parking lot.  This tour costs more, but the scenery and experience would be well worth the cost if the alternative is sitting by a cafeteria for hours.

Julie took most of her photos on the way down, theorizing that she would more accurately know how much time we could take.  Her iPhone pics turned out particularly lovely on this day, picking up the light better than my Motorola.  You may be able to tell which images she took based on the lighting, but basically I took the photo of Julie plus "L" videos, and the designated photos at the bottom of this post, while Julie took the rest.

As you can see, we had occasional drizzle and not exactly the sunny blue skies we enjoyed in Skjolden, but it was all beautiful.  Cool mist in the air makes hiking feel less strenuous than what might seem more ideal hot sunshine.

In any case, I think the pictures and videos do most of the talking about what we saw, if never capturing the full grandeur.

After we returned to the ship, we went through our usual rituals, including afternoon coffee in the atrium, and soon we were on our way to the next port.

Cruising through Norwegian Fjords is always a treat, and on that evening the sun became considerably brighter than it had been during our hike to the glacier.

As I mentioned in another post, cruising Norway has a great deal in common with river cruises, from the easily accessed port villages to beautiful views off the side of the ship.  With long spring days stretching until close to midnight, we snagged window seats when possible to enjoy the onboard entertainment in the evening,

Getting back to climate change, which seems to have become a pet topic for me, the Pavlovian response these days seems to be to blame manmade greenhouse gasses.  They are a factor, but I personally would say human encroachment in general has a lot to do with warming than CO2, which in graphs seems to increase about 700 years after a global warming period.

On the other hand, I can understand that as concrete and asphalt fill cities, they serve as thermal mass heat storage for solar power, which is why the Disneyland parking lot is hotter than an orange grove.

Regardless of human activity, the climate has been changing ever since the earth began, according to geologic and other natural evidence.

On the first Earth Day back in 1970, environmentalists worried about global cooling, with a new ice age brought on by human pollution projected to bring mass starvation by the mid-1990s.  I find the specter of a freezing future without food somehow more alarming than a degree or two warmer fifty years from now.

Those claims of an impending frozen future seem to have been a bit hyperbolic --- or as I have theorized, perhaps my generation saved the planet by the time disco had played its dance upon the stage --- but we now have lots of folks on the bandwagon to save the planet from global warming.

Oldevatnet Lake, photo stop on excursion

A few years back, anthropogenic global warming theorists realized that if gravity acted as randomly as their greenhouse gas global warming formulas, then some soccer balls kicked in the air for a corner kick might never fall back down to earth, so they started calling it "climate change." 

Some politicians attribute recent wildfires to climate change.  They claim they know how to prevent climate change, even if Smokey the Bear hasn't been able to prevent forest fires.  Under government stewardship, underbrush has not been properly cleared out and other forest mismanagement have laid the groundwork for disaster.  

However, that's just my opinion.  You can believe whatever you want, but you should do so because of what you see and experience for yourself.  If you believe in climate change, you should see it for yourself on a cruise through Norway!

Julie's Short Video Links

Briksdal Glacier View from the Bridge

Falls Along the Hiking Trail

Another View of the Falls

More of Julie's Photos

Wes's Photos