Surreal Footage Shows an Explorer Walking Into a Glacier’s Ice Cave on Top of a Volcano

Iceland's Katla Ice Cave is a remarkable work of nature. Sculpted over thousands of years of glacial floods, icy blizzards, and volcanic eruptions, the cave sits inside the Kötlujökull glacier on top of a volcano that has been sleeping for the past 100 years. Like rings of a tree, the icy tunnels tell the story of how this volcano influenced the rebirth of this glacier, supporting it to become mature and solid. Recently, explorer and tour guide Asa Steinars (@asasteinars) filmed herself in a video while walking through the surreal, icy corridor of this cave. After watching the video, viewers are already adding this ice cave to their travel bucket lists. 

The footage, which has been viewed more than 3.7 million times, shows Steinars dressed in winter clothes with a safety harness strapped on, entering the otherworldly cavern enclosed within a rounded tunnel of craggy ice. As she walks through the tunnel, the camera reveals undulating waves of ice running through the walls. At the farthest end, beams of sunlight appear to be crashing against the icy walls, evoking glitter. Meanwhile, the grooves in the icy blue walls become a canvas for the Sun’s light.

As Steinars walks through the corridor and her shoes come in contact with the frozen glacial floor, they make sounds of crunching and rumbling that punctuate the background music score. In the end, Steinars walks out of the tunnel, stepping into the light and onto a majestic ice arch. For a few moments, she stands there, making a glamorous pose for the camera, before the video wraps up.

Walking into this cave isn’t just a sightseeing experience. It’s akin to immersing oneself in a 1000-year-old tale when the glacier was still an infant. Now that its ice has matured and crisped by the forces of fire and floods, it looks even more surreal than ever. “Walking inside of 1000-year-old glacial ice… how wild is that? Before we know it, Iceland will turn blue again,” Steinars wrote in the video caption. Adding a poetic description for her experience, she wrote, “The frozen winter landscapes. The crisp air. These caves blow my mind every single year!”

Perched on Iceland’s south coast, the cave is a stunning illustration of what happens when ice meets fire. Years and years of struggle have turned this glacier into a skilled artist that carves and disintegrates its giant arches as per the whims of weather, erosion, and glacial meltdowns, per Arctic Adventures. Solid columns are held up on huge roofs of ice, and long, twisty tunnels run and cascade through the icy chambers.

Scientists say that the black stripes we see etched into these tunnels of ice are actually streaks of volcanic ash or “dragon glass,” spewed by erupting volcanoes. “It’s seriously one of the coolest things you can experience here,” Steinars commented. Viewers called the video a “bucket list experience.” @h_in.es_m said, “Sometimes I feel that these places are not real because of their beauty.”

You can follow Asa Steinars (@asasteinars) on Instagram to watch more fascinating videos of her adventures in Iceland.

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