Well, *That* Was a Learning Experience

So, it turns out that if you die in Icecrown, start flying back to your corpse, leave to make a sandwich, and come back running in place against a wall in Wintergrasp, it is impossible to get back to Icecrown.

Instead, one must find the waterfall over Icemist Village, fall, run through the village and all of Dragonblight, and then navigate the Crystal Vice to get back to Crystalsong Forest, where one regains the spectral gryphon.

It was a learning experience. A very long learning experience.

The moral of the story: Don't go AFK on a spectral gryphon.