At some point, hiking up the volcano, I began to think about how I was going to get down. At the turnaround point for those of us who were not going to summit, my legs already felt like jello. At one point, I contemplated just lying down and rolling. The ending could be tough, but I was almost willing to take a chance. It was about then that our guide told us we would be glissading down.594569-glacisading
Basically, you wrap around your butt a canvas “diaper” around your butt, sit down with your feet in front of you, drag your ice ax in the snow to one side, and push off. Dragging the ice ax works to slow your speed. The more forcefully you dig your ice ax in, the slower you go. Real climbers (our guides) stood and “skied” down the slope in front of us, I suppose to stop us in time if one of us was heading for the boulder field at the bottom. Thrilling.
