I am Bear Grylls.
I have served with the British Special Forces.
I have climbed to the summit of Everest
and crossed the frozen oceans of the Arctic.
Now, I am in Iceland,
a land of huge glaciers and volcanoes.
It is really blowing a hoolie here.
Every year thousand tourists need to be rescued.
I am going to show you the skills needed to survive here.
I am flying out of Iceland's capital Reykjavik,
on the southwest coast where most of the 300,000 people live.
The island lies just on the Arctic Circle in between
the US and Europe.
It's about the size of Kentucky,
but only has one main road that follows the coast
all around the island.
Most of the country is just a barren frozen wasteland.
This place has a strange beauty about it
but it's also unforgiving down there.
Iceland's original settlers were the Vikings
who came from Norway over thousand years ago.
They knew how to survive these harsh climates.
People come here to experience a unique geology
that's called the Land of Fire and Ice.
Fire because it is one of the most volcanic countries in the world.
And Ice because over 2000 square miles
of it are glaciers.
(HELICOPTER NOISE)
On average, three people a day are rescued
from the freezing glaciers and huge volcanic plains.
And the glacier is directly under me
and those places are one of the toughest places to survive
and that's where I am starting my journey.
All I have got is a knife, a water bottle and a flint.
A camera crew will follow me.
(CAMERA CREW FOOT STEPS SOUND)
At 4,000 feet I am on a glacier
on one of Iceland's highest and coldest points.
Man, this place is bleak.
I am here in the middle of winter.
Just now, it's 15 degrees Fahrenheit
but in a few hours it can get down to a deadly minus 10.
Get some feeling back in my hands again.
My goal is to descend to the warmer areas around the coast.
That's where I will have the best chance of finding a road
leading back towards Reykjavik in the southwest.
One of the simplest ways of finding out north and south
when you are in the northern hemisphere is just to use
your watch and the sun.
And all I need to do is point the hour hand at the sun
so if it is three o'clock now,
I point that at the sun and then half way between
there and 12 o'clock is south, I am heading southwest,
so I want to keep heading this way.
As Iceland is in the middle of the north Atlantic,
its weather changes very quickly
and storms can roll in literally in minutes.
When I landed it was sunny
but now I am in the middle of a full-blown blizzard.
One of the biggest dangers up here on these glaciers in conditions
like this is hypothermia and you know,
it can set in very quickly.
Just a drop of a couple of degrees in your core body temperature
will bring it on
and you start shivering and you start to slur your words,
lose your ability to think straight
and I have had it before and it's very frightening.
Without a shelter,
I would only survive a matter of hours in blizzard conditions.
But as quickly as it came, the storm lifts
and it gives me a brief chance to get my bearings.
What I have spotted down here is this ice cave
and...
That might well do for some protection.
The problem is this cornice all the way up here
and how I am going to get over this, over this lip and down to there.
It's a 60 foot drop to the bottom
and the overhanging ledges can collapse easily.
Probably my best way of doing this is just
to traverse along this snow bank and I need to be careful
because you can see down there looks like a lip
might well be a cliff dropping straight off that.
You have got to be really careful doing this
without crampons and without an ice axe or rope.
It just means you have got to be really certain
of every foothold that you take.
Okay, start edging across.
Okay, I am out of the nasty bit of this now
and it is just the last little chute down into the cave.
I love these bits.
This is much bigger than I thought. Look at this.
I am actually, this is not a cave. It is actually a funnel.
Look, you can see it is open at the bottom.
But these, these things are formed.
What happens, melt water comes down the glacier
and because the water is warmer than the ice it creates these,
these like tunnels running under the glacier.
But when they get bigger they grow into this sort of thing.
You don't want to hang around, hang around in this.
See a lot of that,
look it is blue ice as well and that is the oldest sort of ice
but it is also the most dangerous. It is the most likely to crack.
Blue ice, it is hard as steel but it is also as brittle as glass.
And because the glacier is constantly moving,
collapses is a common.
You can actually see, look, if you follow this up,
you can actually see a bit of it where it has flaked off
and you can imagine what that's gonna do
if that dropped on top you.
Last year a climber was in an ice cave just like this
and a 150 tonne slab sheared off.
He stood no chance of surviving.
I was hoping this was gonna be a good place to shelter
but it's not, it's just gonna act like a wind funnel
and I need to think again and get out of here pretty fast now.
As it grows darker, a storm once again is moving in.
I have got minutes before it's gonna hit me.
Let's keep moving because I have got to get off here soon.
Already temperatures are minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit.
There's no sign of shelter and this storm is getting worse.
I have got just 30 minutes before nightfall.
I am on a glacier in Iceland.
A blizzard has come in, night is falling and I need shelter fast.
It's minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit
but winds of 50 mile an hour make it much colder.
But the wind is not only my enemy, it can also be my friend.
And what happens when the wind blows over these sort of ridges,
if you look up here,
it builds up a load of snow on the leeward side of it,
on the side out of the wind.
And I can use that snow then to dig into
and create like a little snow cave.
A couple of years ago a snowmobiler got separated
from his friends during a blizzard.
He managed to stay alive for 48 hours before rescue came
because he got out of the wind by digging himself a snow hole.
This is definitely harder work without any form of shovel.
But all of this snow is quite nice and loose.
And the bits that are coming out in blocks like this
I'm gonna keep so I can use those to then dam up
the entrance at the end.
I am keeping my pace steady.
If I allow sweat to freeze on my body,
hypothermia will come on twice as fast.
Well, I am out of the wind now at least
and that's taken me maybe 20 odd minutes
just to dig out this little area of good loose powdered snow.
But the next thing I need to do is dig a little bit of a pit down,
and the reason I do that is that cold air sinks.
So I do not want this cold air around me,
I want it to go down into what they call a cold well down here.
And what I want to do now is just block up
a bit of this entrance here.
It is tempting to seal the entrance completely to keep the wind out
but that can be lethal.
Okay, what I have done here is just put some of the blocks over the top
and this will all consolidate down, left a bit of a ventilation hole.
I put my hand out here and it's blowing hard
and it is snowing,
and this will give it a light covering
but I need to make sure keep putting my hand through to keep
that ventilation hole.
Otherwise, you can suffocate in these things.
Staying hydrated helps keep your body warm.
It is tempting to eat the snow
but that would just cool my core body temperature down even more.
So I am going to melt some snow slowly overnight with my body heat.
It is about 3:00 a.m.
but I am just a bit concerned
because my hands and my feet are starting to get really numb now.
And it's just like becoming a real mental battle, you know,
just to keep, keep wiggling them and not just giving up.
I just, just want this night to end now.
It's morning.
And my main priority is to get off this glacier.
I just can't risk being caught in another storm up here.
Well, it is definitely less windy than it was yesterday.
It is still pretty windy
but actually I can see the sun over there,
which is a good sign.
But in Iceland the sun does not rise in the east and sets in the west.
It is more like southeast and southwest.
So if that is southeast, now the sun has just come up,
that means that is southwest is over there.
That's the way I want to go.
Glaciers are full of these ice gullies
and they can be dangerous.
All of this snow here this is what is called rotten snow,
which means it has fallen, it has thawed and then it is refrozen.
So you get this like crust, which is really good for walking on.
I can just dig my feet in and get really good holds in it.
But the danger on glaciers are crevasses.
What you often get with crevasses is just a thin covering
of compacted snow that is called a snow bridge.
And you can see there just one has collapsed
and this is why they are so dangerous.
You do not know when you are on one
and you do not know what is under you as well.
I mean these could be sometimes yeah, hundreds of feet deep just
narrow chasms underneath you
and therefore I have just got to be ultra careful to stick to the sides
of these gullies.
If you fall into a crevice,
they can be impossible to get out of.
And with no chance of escape, a slow death is all that awaits you.
And this really is the very end of the glacier.
You know, I have always thought of glaciers as like,
like living beasts.
You know, they move and they shift
and they groan and often they are angry.
But I am on my way.
I'm now at 3,000 foot
and the temperature is just above freezing.
Finally, it looks like an easier southwest route
but almost immediately there's a deep river blocking my way.
All of that water is glacial melt water.
It's gonna be freezing, freezing cold.
But I really need to try and keep heading this way
to where I am heading southwest.
I want to do anything I can to avoid being in that.
So I need to think of some way of trying to get across this.
But there may be a solution on the other side of the river.
I can see some steam coming
from some vents on the hillside over there
and that means geothermic hot pools,
warm water and therefore jumping
into this glacial water is a risk I can take.
But it's a big risk.
Submerged in freezing water and with a cold wind,
I only have less than 20 minutes to make it to those hot pools
before I lose consciousness.
To be able to climb down this
and really I have got no choice apart from just jumping it.
But it's easily deep enough, the water is crystal clear.
I am seeing all the way to the bottom but it is high.
This is probably, about a 30 foot jump
and I just know that water is glacial.
It's gonna be freezing and as soon as I go into it,
it's gonna be a ticking time bomb between hypothermia
and reaching those pools.
I am in Iceland heading southwest towards
what I hope will be a town and rescue.
But a deep glacial river is blocking my route.
My only option is to jump.
Okay.
The freezing water can send my body into shock.
I am also rapidly losing heat
and that's making me weaker by the second.
Oh, my god.
I have only got about 15 minutes
to get my body temperature back to normal.
My only hope is to reach the geothermal pools
but they are a mile away.
And that is just bitingly cold.
God, my hands and all my legs just feel numb straight away.
And I just know I have just got to keep every limb moving
until I reach those pools.
I need my hood.
The air is literally refrigerating my body.
Okay, guys I am gonna have to run this.
I am getting really cold.
In extreme cold,
my body acts to protect the brain and heart by draining blood away
from my hands and feet.
And that makes running even harder.
Well, it's a hot pool but look at this,
you can actually see, see that it's bubbling.
That is at boiling temperature and there is no way,
there is no way I am getting into that.
I am feeling my arms and legs beginning to shut down.
I am running out of time.
I need to think quickly now.
You can see this stream, it's just running out of that hot mud pool.
(INAUDIBLE)
And all I am doing here is damming up this bit of the stream
and then hoping to create a bit of a pool for me to get in.
Yeah, and that's kind of a manageable temperature.
I have got to get in fast
and if I don't get these wet clothes off
my body will go into shock.
In this wind they should hopefully dry
in maybe a couple of hours
but at least during that time,
I can lie in this hot pool and not freeze to death.
God.
Thank God for volcanoes.
And it's amazing, look there is snow all around me.
Literally, three minutes ago, I was not far off from hypothermia.
Now, it's kind of almost like being at home,
apart from a bit muddier.
After warming up and my clothes nearly dry,
it's time to move on.
Iceland has many geothermal areas
and over 90 percent of homes are fuelled
by naturally heated water.
This comes from underground rivers being heated by volcanic magma.
I need to be a bit careful with where I am treading here
because what you often get are these soft areas of mud,
where actually the mud is at boiling point,
you know really frothing away and every year,
yeah, there will be several tourists
who will get stuck in this stuff and get really, really badly burned.
The way just to test the ground is just to step really gingerly
and just push with your boot to see whether the mud is soft or not.
And also just to tap it as well
l because often it will feel like hollow.
And what that means is you have got this crust over the top
with the mud then boiling underneath it.
And, yeah, look, see even here this is what I mean.
Look, you have got a hole, straight down.
If I trod on that this will probably give way.
So I will step over this bit.
And this is a kind of pretty nasty area here.
I have got a boiling pool on both sides.
Temperatures here are about 40 degrees Fahrenheit,
so edible grasses, moss and lichen can grow.
Since Viking times, sheep have roamed free,
grazing on these grasses
and that also gives me something to eat.
All of this here, look.
See all this?
This all Reindeer moss and this is really good for me to find.
I can tell it's Reindeer moss. Look it is, it is kind of white.
They look a little bit like little branches.
And actually they look quite like, quite like Reindeer antlers as well.
But you can actually eat this
and it's not gonna give me much nutritional value
but what it will do is fill out my stomach
and stop me feeling so hungry
and this is what the Vikings used to use it for.
Survival is all about making the most of opportunities
and it's not long before I get a break.
And this is a real find.
Yeah, he probably just came down this cliff, got stuck,
wedged in here and has died.
But most Icelandic sheep in the wintertime,
they are taken inside.
But there are always a few that don't get rounded up.
And this is obviously one of them.
But he hasn't been dead that long.
His eyeballs are still there,
which means he is probably only, you know,
maybe a few days since he has died.
And the good thing about Iceland
is because it is so cold here meat will last much, much longer.
And now I have got, see all of it. It's really, really nice meat.
And now I've got this bit off.
I can just begin to cut the meat
away from all the skin
and now it's gonna cut a nice strip of this fat as well.
Fat should be stored whenever possible.
The oils can be used in many survival situations
like emergency food or fire.
Icelanders eat almost every part of the sheep,
you know, everything from testicles, heart, liver,
you know, even the eyeballs.
And actually I am going to take this out.
Sheep eyeballs, extremely nutritious.
They're high in protein and rich in vitamin A and D.
Usually, they are the first things to rot
but in this cold weather, these are still good.
And the eyeball,
give them a dunk in the geothermal
and cook the meat in there as well because it's boiling.
And then all of this is gonna be good enough to eat.
I could eat the meat raw
but it's harder to digest
and can actually take energy away from the body.
So cook meat whenever you can.
And then you see here just where all the water is boiling.
Then all I need to do is take my shoelace off
and then if I just put a little loop in the end here...
Like that.
And then just go straight through these bits of meat
I can then thread this through.
And then just this last bit
and then what I am gonna do is loop it through itself.
And that then is ready to go into the boiling water.
And look, instantly you see it turning brown there.
That's how hot this water is.
And while the meat is cooking,
on one end of the shoelace I can take the other end of it
and just thread it through this eyeball.
These are really okay to eat raw.
I am just gonna dip it in here just to get any sort
of bacteria off it, give it a quick blast in the boiling water.
And then...
This eyeball is going to be okay to eat.
God, it is like chewing...
Gristle full of cold gloop.
Ten minutes of cooking time
and my main course should be done.
And let's see, see if this is ready.
That tastes like just the,
the best lamb you get in a restaurant,
cooked in volcanic boiling water.
With a full belly, it's time to get moving again.
Already I can feel the wind changing and the Icelanders have a saying,
"If you don't like the weather just wait five minutes
and it will get a lot, lot worse."
I am in the wilderness in Iceland.
I am heading southwest direct of it
but now there's a huge freezing river to cross.
Another storm with 50 mile an hour Arctic winds has whipped up
and the temperature has plummeted to minus 15 degrees.
It is really blowing a hoolie here
but I have got to get across this river, somehow.
And this is not the narrowest part
but it is the shallowest bit of the river
and I can use it to my advantage.
And you can see the rocks in it creating like these eddies,
the slack water behind them.
And I can use that to go from one to the next and then out.
But this water is gonna be freezing cold,
especially the wind chill factor.
So I have got to do everything I can to make sure my clothes,
especially my top half, stays dry.
Soaking wet clothes in these conditions are lethal.
So I am keeping my clothes dry
by wrapping them in my waterproof jacket.
I am facing up stream into the water.
It's easier to keep my balance.
I can't afford to slip here.
Well, I am across and all of these clothes
have actually stayed amazingly dry in that.
And then what they used to say in the army,
if we ever complain of being cold they would make us do burpees
and 10 of these and you are warm again.
Okay, I am on my way.
After 15 minutes,
the storm has disappeared as quickly as it arrived.
I have spotted a forest in the distance.
In Iceland, the poor soil,
wind and temperature means trees are few and far between.
But when you do find them,
they are great for both shelter and wildlife.
Hey, look at this. This is Ptarmigan feathers here.
See this, all of this and Ptarmigan is like a,
like a type of grouse but this is what they have,
this white winter plumage.
And what it does, look,
it camouflages them well with the snow.
And it's good news for me if there are Ptarmigans around.
I might well be able to get one.
Ptarmigan are known as snow chickens in the US
because of their winter plumage
and they feed on berries and seeds beneath the trees.
This is, and this is kind of what I am looking for here.
Look, a bit of a natural,
a natural channel where Ptarmigans might well pass.
So all I need to do is use one of my shoelaces.
Just tie this end
in a really simple...
Little overhand knot
that gives me a little loop.
And then tie this end around the tree.
And then just set this one in that side
and drape that over here.
And the idea is if a Ptarmigan comes along,
goes through this,
it will get snared in that and stuck to the tree.
I will set several traps and hope that one will pay off by morning.
My next priority is to find shelter and to build a fire.
I am gonna make a traditional shelter used by the Vikings.
And what I am doing here
is just making a nice springy mattress.
Then I will build up the walls with rocks,
in the shape of a coffin, to trap the heat inside.
This bit of the wall I have built higher
so I can then put some branches over the top of this.
And these dead branches have like a natural bow to them there,
which means I can just drape them over the top
and there is enough room under here for me to lie.
Now, I just need to put some moss on top of here.
This should be waterproof.
Now, I am on the lookout for fuel for a nice warm fire.
There are loads of these birch trees around here
and these are what I am looking for.
And I can tell they are birch just
because of the way they are silver limbed.
At this time of year in the winter all the leaves have fallen off
but it is the leaves underneath them that I am after
and these are gonna make good tinder for my fire.
I am going to need loads of wood to keep me warm all night.
I am just building up like a wall of rocks around it
as well just to protect it
and then keep building it up.
For the first time since I dropped on to that glacier.
I can just feel really nice warmth in my hands.
Oh, it's nice.
There is just about room for one pretty sleepy Bear.
I hope it doesn't rain.
Anyway, I need rest.
So far I have coped with everything Iceland has thrown at me.
But it's deadly lava tunnels might be the one thing that beats me.
Oh, no.
This has just got an awful lot harder.
I've spent a cold night in my Viking shelter.
Last night I set some traps and I am hoping I get lucky.
Well, the sun's up at least
and it was quite windy last night, you know.
I spent a lot of the night trying to keep this fire going
so I was burning through fuel much faster than I thought.
So I want to build this up and then go and check,
check my traps.
Last night I laid traps for Ptarmigan,
a type of grouse found in Iceland.
No nothing, nothing in this.
But you know, it's no great, no great surprise.
You know, my past experience says realistically to get things
in snares I need to set, you know, a really good number of these.
But so much of survival is just about, you know,
keep trying and having the energy to make these sort of things
even when you are tired
and you do not really feel like it, you know.
But in trap number two, I get lucky.
Well, that is the first Ptarmigan that I have ever caught.
And I have caught grouse before but never Ptarmigan
and this is really good news.
Take it back to camp.
I don't need to pluck this.
There's a faster way.
I just can't head and wings off
and peel the skin of the breast back,
Push there and all the skin will come off.
And then just get my hands in
and pull all of its guts all the way down to the back
and peel all of this back.
Oh, I can't wait to eat this.
The Ptarmigan is a popular Christmas dish in Iceland
but I'm not waiting that long.
This one's gonna be ready in about 15 minutes.
Look at that, all that dark meat,
quite strong.
Now, it's also, it is going to be really good energy
and calories and I need both of those things at the moment.
I am still heading on my southwest direction.
Before long I get to one of the many ancient lava fields,
that covers over 10 percent of Iceland.
They're formed by volcanic eruptions
when the molten rock cools and solidifies
and they can be treacherous to cross.
See here all of this lava fields just covered in this moss.
And it's just making crossing it really slow, slow work.
And also, I need to be careful just
because it's hard to tell what the Moss is growing over.
Whether it's like a halo or gap or solid rock.
I mean, just too easy to twist an ankle in this stuff.
Yeah. Look at this. Look see, all these little holes.
That's what I'm talking about.
The last volcanic eruption was in 2004
but some of these lava fields are ancient,
more than 7,000-years-old.
And they hold a special place in Icelandic folklore.
The idea of elves and trolls
is really embedded in Icelandic culture.
And they say about 50 percent of Icelanders
still today believe in elves and trolls
and they are meant to live in the rocks.
And some are meant to be good
and some are meant to more mischievous.
I just hope it is the good ones looking after me out here.
This lava field here is just full of these sort of caves
and actually what this is, is actually an old lava tunnel.
And this is where originally flowing molten red-hot lava
would have been racing through this.
And what happens when that's gone,
it leaves behind these sort of tubes.
But what I am really struggling with now I am off the glacier
is finding fresh water.
And, you know, all of this lava field,
the exact translation into Icelandic is literally no water.
But my best chance is to get in there
and see if I can find some seeps coming through,
through the walls, of fresh water.
First of all, before I even think about getting in there,
I have got to make some sort of torch.
Yeah, it is pitch black.
I can make a torch out of some twigs
and the fat I saved from the dead sheep.
Get down here out of the wind.
The cave water is filtered through the rock.
So it will be a lot purer than the outlying snow,
which can be full of bacteria.
Okay, now what I need is just a bit of the material from my t-shirt.
And I have got some of this sheep's fat,
wrap this round like so,
take this bit of T-shirt and then tie that round it.
Now, if I can just get a little fire going,
that fat will burn really bright.
Try and get this going.
Okay, let's go.
But I need to be really careful because all of this is fragile
and sharp!
That's why I am gonna need my gloves in here.
Iceland has an average 33 earthquakes a day
and any one of those could collapse this tube.
I have gotta be quick.
What I am looking for is just a good source of dripping water.
This roof is just getting lower and lower now, which I don't like.
Look, and that's why, look. You see that?
All of this part of the ceiling here has just collapsed.
Oh, no, it's a bad time for the torch to come apart.
Come on. If this goes out I am in real trouble.
There you go, look, you can just see all of this stuff here
is where it has collapsed.
And this is why these places are so dangerous.
I want to get water and get out of here as quick as I can.
I'm in a lava tube in Iceland searching for water
but my torch is dying fast.
There's a little seep of water coming through the rock here
and this is good enough to drink.
Yeah, that is as, as good as I am going to get around here.
Oh, that's nice.
I now have a full water bottle.
I just want to get out of this lava tube
before this fire dies.
I have to do the rest of this in the dark if this goes out
and that is not what I want. Look, it's gone.
Oh, no.
I am forced to do the last 200 yards in darkness.
But at last I've made it to the cave exit.
I'm at the edge of the lava fields
but I will still need all my energy to cross the vast plains
that stretch in front of me.
Just when I want to get some real distance.
A 50 miles an hour wind closes in.
And this wind just suddenly whipped up from nothing
in about half an hour
and it's just like making progress almost impossible.
This is probably gusting...
It's probably gusting like 50, 60 miles an hour.
And what it does,
is just whip up,
whip up the sand and blast it into your face,
all the pebbles.
And, look, if I try to lean into this wind.
That's how strong it is.
Hey. Get down here.
This is, this is actually a kettle hole in this black sand desert.
This gives me a chance to get out of the wind.
Look, you notice just like two foot under the surface
and already I can already hear myself think again
and the wind is still screaming, screaming over my head here.
These are just a brilliant find,
give me a chance just to maybe sit here,
wait a while and see if this wind is going to ease up.
I take the chance just to sit it out and rest.
But storms like these have been known to last for weeks,
so I am forced to keep going.
I am on what Icelanders call the Sandur.
It stretches for over 100 miles down to the coast and can be treacherous.
All of this area here is just now vast black sand plain
and it's that dangerous combination of loose sand and water.
And it's been known in the past literally
to swallow up men and horses.
And there is something, something eerie about this place.
But the way to cross this is to just to aim always for the higher ground,
you know, watch out for the shallower depressions
that are going to be boggier.
And if you do find yourself in those,
you have got to back away and go around to the higher ground.
Otherwise I could find myself waist deep in quicksand.
In the past, Icelandic sailors were unaware of the deadly hazards
of the black sands and many perished whilst coming ashore.
I do not know if you can see on that horizon,
over the black sands there,
I can see some pylons.
And it's kind of hard to see in the sun
but those are definitely electricity pylons
and I am hoping the other side of that might well be the road.
There is no doubting it.
It is a coastal highway
and from here I will be able to catch a lift back to Reykjavik.
And that is the end of my journey.
And really, you know, winter in Iceland,
this land of Fire and Ice has just shown me Mother Nature
at her most raw.
And it has been extreme high winds and extreme low temperatures
and really it has pushed me to my limits.
Subtitle Caption by ZestCorp