Here, the world's most prolific glacier, called the Sermeq Kujalleq or Jakobshavn, slips into the sea at more than 100 feet per day - a rate that has accelerated with global warming. Yet the huge ice chunks that split from it can't sail far; the mouth of the fjord is relatively shallow - only about 650 feet deep - and the bergs back up like SUVs on a Monday morning at the Golden Glades Interchange.

The result is an ice jam of Matterhorns and Space Mountains, amphitheaters and Gibraltar Rocks, Soviet apartment blocks - all curved and swept, carved and etched in ice. The icefjord is so unique that it's been tagged as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

When the massive bergs finally do break loose, the chunks often drift into the Labrador Current and sail south into the Atlantic. The iceberg that felled the Titanic likely originated here.

You can easily hike to part of the ice wall, and we do. The view is staggering _ or so we think, until we sail on a small whale watching boat along the 3.5 miles of a frozen edge of majesty that reaches more than 250 feet tall. The passengers stare and snap - but say little. The words are long gone.

So, too, may be the icebergs. Just 25 years ago, the chunks were a good 60 feet higher, we learn from Frederike Bronny, the geographer on board our Fram sailing.

And the glacier itself is in rapid retreat. One estimate suggests that within 10 years the Kangia will no longer reach the sea. The ice will calve in shards. The massive icebergs will be gone.

It's a somber thought _ nearly unimaginable as we stand in the face of this crystal blue bulwark. Too much, too much, so soon. At least we're here now.

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GREENLAND SNAPSHOT

Greenland is the world's biggest non-continental island.

-Area: 836,330 square miles; about three times the size of Texas

-Area under ice: More than 80 percent

-Population: 56,344; 80 percent Inuit

-Sled dogs: 29,000

-Coastal temperature: Summer highs in mid-50s F, winter lows to 3 F

-Language: Greenlandic. English and Danish are widely spoken.

-Government: Part of Denmark, but with "home rule." Receives annual subsidy from Denmark of more than U.S. $500 million.

-Chief industry: Fishing

-Tourists: 55,000 per year