Trekking the glaciers in snowy spring

Hi Karonny!
An interesting question. What I understand is you want to traverse a glacier without skis, Am i right? Question is which glacier. There are small ones that you can cross in an hour and then there are really big ones( miles across) that you cant cross in a day. Unlikely you will be killed crossing a glacier ( unless there is an avalanche). Physically very demanding. You have to be very fit as high altitude air is very thin on oxygen. Based on my experience, here is my advice.
1. Chose glacier to start with and base town( Skardu or Gilgit)
2. Once you check into hotel tell the manger to arrange a guide for you. The guide will then determine the number and type of porters based on the length of expedition. remember, glacier is not "just across the road", you have to trek a couple of days to reach there.
3. Shoes. Just bring a pair of good quality ice/ climbing shoes and crampons. You can also hire crampons in Gilgit or Skardu. You will be a bit embarrassed when you see your porters hopping slabs of ice in their flip- flops.

Feel free to ask if you need further advice. What you are thinking is doable fun and something that will make you proud later in life ( like me)

Ciao

Boots and crampons wont be enough, need snowshoes. The question is, will 2 pairs of snowshoes even be enough....two porters break trail for the rest of the group?

Two candidates....Batura and Biafo. Biafo seem to be the ticket because of 'snow lake' and its proximity to Skardu. It seems to be reasonably smooth and not heavily crevassed. I want to see snow lake from the terminus of the Biafo but probably wont actually want to be on snow lake; from reading people's experiences it seems falling into massive crevasses on a regular basis there is inevitable...
Not doing the Hispar crossing/Hispar glacier as its obviously too difficult.

Trekking in snow/ice conditions is much more demanding, difficult and dangerous than on bare rocks. You have to take it into consideration vs. your previous experience from high mountains in normal conditions.
Seeing in your profile that you live in Australia, I can assume that you have little experience with snow and ice.

Agreed fieldgate. It is much more demanding and dangerous than bare rocks, but still enormously rewarding. First time I did it was more than two decades ago, and like Karonny, a million things were going through my mind. But as I said earlier, doable and immensely rewarding. Few tips for Karonny;

a) Biafo is a good choice
Dangers:
1. Unpredictable weather, Scorching hot one minute and freak blizzard next. So be prepared.
2. Crevaces: Deadly indeed and many. However, local guides know the safe routes.
3. No medical support after Askole. Unless you have pre-arranged heli-evac, you are on your own. Biggest threats i foresee is a broken bone, may be twisted ankle. More than that will be bad tummy. Bloody thing just saps all the energy out of you. So stock up on flagyl and antibiotics before hitting the trail.

B) Fitness, both physical and mental. You will be hiking 8-10 hours a day. On top of that high altitude and walking on ice take a heavy toll body and mind. Best way to counter that, take it easy, don't rush. Give yorself at least two weeks. You may finish a few days early. No harm done.
Best is to acclimitize yourself and do some light, high altitude treks. Skardu- deosai- skardu would be good.

C) How many porters? Difficult to answer. It all depends on multiple factors. When i did it the max. weight limit/ porter was 25 kg. But that was long time ago. May be other forum members can give current limit. Its no harm hiring a a couple extra and lighten individual loads. They are not very expensive.

Hope this helps.

I have trekked in knee-deep snow before at altitude and in winter in central asia, but only 3000m. Not in a glacier setting. Snow shoes would have made things a lot easier.

Are you two saying that snow shoes wont do much in Biafo? I thought trudding in snow in snow shoes would be even easier than walking in moraine?

The main danger seems to be crevasses.

I've never used snow shoes, but I could imagine they'd be very awkard in mountainous terrain. I trekked in that area but in summer months. It's rocks, boulders and gravel.
3000m isn't much in terms of altitude. We're talking here 5000m and higher. Normally, you start feeling high altitude at 3500-4000m, where you also need to start acclimatisation.

Provided its not steep then I think it will be ok in snow shoes. The steeper parts of the trek are in the lower elevations where there wont be snow in spring.

I'm only intending to trek to 4600m, just in sight of snow lake. Reading about bus-sized crevasses in snow lake scare me so I probably want to avoid going into it.

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