This is the most important glacier in the Alps. It runs for 24 km in a broad valley from the Berner Oberland region, an impressive relic of the last ice age, which covered much of Europe 15000 years ago. Mountain director Gerhard Baur climbed inside the glacier with his team and discovered a wonderful world of ice, with crystal corridors and fairy-tale palaces. For many years, the Swiss researcher Dr. Hanspeter Holzhauser of the University of Zurich has been studying the fossil wood protruding from the Aletsch glacier. When Egyptian civilisation reached its maximum peak 3000 years ago, there was a large, impressive forest where the glacier is located today.