We were positioned on the frozen sea between Ross Island and the Antarctic continent, and along the wiggly island coast land met sea in a solid tangle of blue pressure-ridges and pleated glacier cliffs.
This is a harsh yet magnificent land of snowy peaks, distant glaciers, towering cliffs, deep ravines and a few beggarly terraces of skimpy grass.
OO Warming Is Sending Mountain Glaciers 'Off A Cliff' Clearer pictures of how glaciers worldwide are changing helps improve predictions of how everything from local water supplies to global sea levels could be affected as glaciers melt.
Typically the foreign clients who pay up to $50,000£32,00000) for a chance to reach the summit on commercial expeditions only pass through the icefall – a lethal jumble of blocks of ice and crevasses formed when the Khumbu glacier slides over cliffs on Everest's lower slopes – once or twice.
Take a Small-Group Franz Josef Glacier Walk along New Zealand's famous southern glacier, where jutting ice cliffs, dangling icicles and natural hot springs make for a rewarding, unique trek; or head to Alaska for a Mendenhall Glacier Trek and Climb, where you'll be truly off the beaten track.
The coast is characterised by cliffs, glacier-headed fjords and deep anchorages.
Beside lava fields and berserkers, Snæfellsnes is a series of volcanoes set against waterfalls and glaciers, enclosed by cliffs and beaches.
Shane McConkey took huge risks in pursuit of his dreams, pulling off feats that most people can hardly fathom (and some dismiss as foolish): big-mountain skiing, base jumping from glaciers, skiing off cliffs à la the chase scene in "The Spy Who Loved Me".
Chileans have a saying that they have a poet hidden under every stone, and certainly this is a place where the landscape inspires creativity, for the deserts, mountains, glaciers, forests and cliffs provide some of the world's most dramatic geography.
The snow at the shed's metal top, irregular as the cliff of a glacier, looks ready to slide down.
