Door to Narnia

The door to Narnia is not actually in a wardrobe, but in Juneau, Alaska. Glaciers are one of the most awe-inspiring natural phenomena on the planet. Alaska has an abundance of these ancient behemoths with Juneau having some easy access.

I spend a lot of my time hiking out to the Mendenhall glacier on the hunt for cool framing options. One of my all-time favorite images was taken at sunset underneath a massive arch of blue ice. Ever since that day, I’ve been on the hunt for another arch that would work it’s magic the same way. During that hunt I came across this small cavern at the terminus of the glacier.

Just because I find an awesome location, doesn’t mean I’m going to get a great picture. When I first found this spot, it had massive icicles hanging from the top. Alaska is quite challenging to get epic pictures due to the weather. Every day around sunset for a 3 week period I would check to see if anything was going to happen. When it finally hit, I happened to be at a meeting. I’m sure it was a goofy sight to see me hustling across the frozen lake with my 40 pounds of gear.

Getting to the base of the glacier was one thing, I still had to climb up to the ledge I had found. This proved challenging since I was in a hurry and everything was completely iced over. When I finally made it, I was almost too late to get the colors I wanted from the setting sun. Thankfully I was able to get the last bit of color before it faded into darkness. Glaciers are always changing and the door to Narnia isn’t in the same place every time you look.