In Pictures: Adventures in Icy Worlds

A sailboat floats through the ice in Svalbard, Norway.
Photograph by Gabe Rogel, Aurora
Snowboarders wait atop a mountain in Haines, Alaska, after being dropped at the peak by a helicopter.
Photograph by Ben Girardi, Aurora
A photographer explores an ice cave on the Vatnajokull glacier in Iceland.
Photograph by Einar Runar Sigurosson, Aurora
A bride picks up a crampon-wearing groom in Juneau, Alaska.
Photograph by Melissa Farlow, National Geographic
A skier climbs a steep slope above Ophir Pass in Colorado’s San Juan National Forest.
Photograph by Kennan Harvey, Aurora
A diver swims past brinicles, or brine icicles, extending from surface ice in Antarctica into the cold water. The frozen tunnels are created when seawater freezes and concentrated brine, which has a lower freezing point, is shot downward.
Photograph by Laurent Ballestra, National Geographic
A hiker stands on Alaska’s Columbia Glacier, where layers of eroded sediment can be seen through the ice.
Photograph by James Balog, Aurora
A swimmer in a dry suit glides through Antarctic waters.
Photograph by Gabe Rogel, Aurora
Light reflects off the ice inside Crystal Cave on Iceland’s Vatnajokull glacier as a man leaps off a snowy hill at an entry point.
Photograph by Johnathan Ampersand Esper, Aurora
A bold hiker jumps into a cold pool on the Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau, Alaska.
Photograph by Ryan Krueger, Aurora
A cave explorer stands at an opening of Athabasca Cave in Alberta, Canada.
Photograph by Juan Pablo De Miguel Moreno, Aurora
A scientist stands at the edge of Birthday Canyon on the Greenland Ice Sheet to survey the build-up of cryoconite—a deposit made of rock, soot, and microbes that accumulates on glacial ice and snow.
Photograph by James Balog, Aurora
An ice guide stands at the entrance of an ice cave on Iceland’s Fjallskokull glacier.
Photograph by Johnathan Ampersand Esper, Aurora
A stand-up paddleboarder glides past a melting iceberg on Bear Lake in Alaska’s Kenai Fjords National Park.
Photograph by Turner Forte, Aurora
An ice climber’s headlamp illuminates Panther Falls in Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada.
Photograph by Paul Zizka, Aurora
A climber pulls himself up the ice on the High Tatra mountains in Slovakia.
Photograph by Adam Kokot, Aurora
A leopard seal brings its face close to a photographer’s underwater camera in Antarctica.
Photograph by Goran Ehlme, National Geographic
Frozen methane bubbles speckle the ice beneath a skater at Lake Minnewanka in Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada.
Photograph by Paul Zizka, Aurora
A man climbs an iceberg in Labrador, Canada.
Photograph by Andrew Querner, Aurora
Sunlight shines down on an ice climber in Juneau, Alaska.
Photograph by Media Drum World, Aurora