Ascension

Each winter in the Canadian Rockies a psychological affliction known as Bubblemania breaks out. The symptoms cause sufferers to lie face down on frozen lakes staring at the ice. The subject of this bizarre spectacle is of course the famous ice bubbles. Decomposing biological matter on lake beds emits methane, a gas with a much lower freezing point than water. When the temperature drops sufficiently, the methane becomes trapped beneath the surface within the ice. The result is mesmerising layers of bubbles, suspended in ascension. Conditions must be perfect, with recently frozen ice and no snow covering, which makes the windswept Lake Abraham, near the Kootenay Plains of Alberta, so beloved of the Bubblemaniacs.