Visual Narrative #055: Aerial Adventures ~ Part I

VN #055: Aerial Adventure ~ Part I
Posted December 22, 2024

 

Aerial Photographic Adventure ~ Part I

 

In VN #053, I introduced you to pilot friend Rick Church, who in this article is about to fly me to the Bridge River Glacier in the south-east corner of the Chilcotin Ark. Rick told me it was one of the most spectacular places in British Columbia, and that I should see it and photograph it for my upcoming book, Flyover. Because Rick is also a photographer, I trusted his recommendation.

‘Count me in’, I replied, and we were off!

Rick Church flying me on a flight of a life-time.

The Bridge River Glacier.

As we rounded one last mountain, I got my first view of the Bridge River Glacier. I was astonished; it was both spectacular, and an instant reminder that climate warming is a reality.

The Bridge River Glacier is receding at a faster pace each year. In the year I made this image, 2012, it calved 125 metres of ice.

A morass of icebergs ~ I

A morass of icebergs II

Icebergs and terminal moraine.

As we circled the glacier, Rick said to me, “when I first started flying over the Bridge River Glacier twenty-five years ago, the glacier covered where I now land my plane (at the far end if the lake).” There was no lake.

As I looked at the gravel bars at the end of the lake, I scouted for camping spots; I knew I had to return. This was a photographic opportunity I could not miss out on.

Crevasse patterns

As glaciers round corners or drop over cliffs in the rock-bed below it, crevasses open up in spectacular arrays of rhythmic patterns. They are stunningly beautiful.

The unimaginable images and stories from the photographic adventure my wife Rita and I were to take here a year later are part of the upcoming visual narratives #’s 056 – 060.

 

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