Hardangerjøkulen

Where it sits. Hardangerjøkulen is the sixth-largest glacier on the Norwegian mainland, a broad ice cap spread across the boundary of Eidfjord and Ulvik municipalities in Vestland county. It lies about five kilometres south of the railway hamlet of Finse, some 16 kilometres north-east of the village of Eidfjord, and 20 kilometres west of Haugastøl. Its summit reaches 1,863 metres — the highest point of the former Hordaland county — while its lowest ice sits at about 1,050 metres. The greatest ice thickness ever measured on it was 380 metres, though the cap has thinned steadily since the early twentieth century, and modelling suggests it could disappear entirely within this century if warming continues at present rates.

How it behaves. This is a plateau glacier rather than a valley glacier: a domed cap that sits on high ground and pushes short tongues down into the surrounding terrain. The best known of these is Blåisen, the blue ice, which comes down towards Finsevatnet and is the tongue almost every visitor sees. Because the cap catches enormous snowfall off the North Sea, it acts as a weather-maker in its own right — clear at Finse and whiteout on the ice is an ordinary combination. Meltwater from the cap feeds rivers running east onto the Hardangervidda plateau and west towards the Hardangerfjord, and it has been monitored by Norwegian glaciologists for well over a century, making it one of the better-studied ice masses in Scandinavia.

On screen. The ice cap did the heavy lifting for the planet Hoth in The Empire Strikes Back. When the second unit arrived at Finse in March 1979, the wide, flat, brilliantly white expanse the production needed for the ground battle — Imperial walkers advancing, snowspeeders lining up their tow cables — was not down at hamlet level but out on the glacier, reached by snowcat from the station. Weather nearly wrecked the schedule: the shoot coincided with the worst storm the district had seen in half a century, and much of the character work was pulled back to the drifts immediately around the hotel while the crew waited for visibility on the ice. The result is that the memorable snowfield vistas of Hoth are Hardangerjøkulen, while the closer human-scale material is Finse.

Walking on it. Blåisen is reached from Finse station by an approach of roughly six kilometres, generally two hours or a little more each way over rock, moraine and old snow. Getting to the ice edge is a hike; going onto the ice is mountaineering. The tongue is crevassed, the surface changes through the season, and unroped travel there has killed people. Guided glacier walks run in summer, typically from late June to early September, with rope, harness and crampons supplied; the Norwegian Trekking Association lodge at Finse and local guiding operations arrange them. In spring, ski tours cross the cap between staffed mountain huts, which is superb terrain but demands navigation skill in flat light.

What you see up there. The plateau surface is almost featureless in bright conditions — one of the reasons it reads as an alien planet on film — but the edges are dramatic: blue crevasse walls, meltwater channels cut into the ice, and long views over the Hardangervidda, Europe's largest high-mountain plateau, with wild reindeer herds ranging across it. The colour of the exposed ice shifts through the day, most intense under overcast skies rather than direct sun, which is the opposite of what most photographers expect.

The other side of the ice. Seen from the south-west the glacier looks completely different. Its Rembesdalskåka tongue falls towards the lake Rembesdalsvatnet above Simadalen, and the meltwater from that side ultimately reaches the inner Hardangerfjord at Eidfjord — the same valley system that carries Vøringsfossen, where the water drops 145 metres into the Måbødalen gorge. Travellers approaching from the fjord therefore see the cap as a white rim above steep green valleys, while those arriving by train from the east see it as the far edge of a bare plateau. Both are the same 70-odd square kilometres of ice.

Getting there and timing. Finse is the only sensible base, and it is reachable only by train on the Bergen Line, roughly four and a half hours from Oslo or two and a half from Bergen. There is no road, no cable car and no shuttle; every metre of the approach is on foot or ski. Mid-June to mid-September is the guided walking season; March to May suits ski touring with a guide. Conditions are alpine year-round: layered clothing, sunglasses, sunscreen and boots that handle wet snow are the minimum, and a whiteout can arrive within the hour. The glacier is not suitable for children on the ice itself, and there is no accessible route to any viewpoint on the cap.