Unsure Footing

SHAKE IT UP BABY, NOW

Sitting with Inspector Gadget at our last dinner together in Buenos Aires I could tell that she was a little depressed. She told me that she wished she had more time and would love to keep travelling, that she was a bit envious of me. To make her feel a little better - and because it happened to be the truth - I confided in her that I myself had hit a kind of travel rut. I was still enjoying myself no doubt, but surely she had picked up on the difference between her reaction to the sights we were seeing (Oh My GOD its gorgeous! I can’t believe we’re actually here!) and mine (Nice . . . . so you wanna grab some lunch?). She asked me if this meant I was finished travelling and my reply was No. I told her that I suppose I just needed to shake things up a bit. I needed a little something to stir the travel pot.

At the time I didn’t know exactly what I was going to do, but I remembered hearing rumors that it was possible to get a last minute spot on boats to Antarctica from the Argentinian port of Ushuaia, the southernmost human settlement in the world (Note: the record actually goes to Puerto Williams on the Chilean side of Tierra del Fuego, but Ushuaia has a much better PR department). This seemed about right. Practically every ship heading to the Great White Continent embarks from Ushuaia and no cruise company likes to sail with empty berths. After a few days and a few unsuccessful attempts at low-balling I did manage to secure a discounted bunk in a 3 man shared cabin on the icebreaker Polar Star. Two days later I was off on my expedition cruise.

IN THE SPIRIT OF ADVENTURE WE RENEW OURSELVES

This is what is written on the back of the complementary waterproof jacket I received when I first boarded the Polar Star. Winter clothing, hats, gloves and protective eyewear we had to bring with us, but everything else would be provided. No need to smuggle snacks or bottles of wine aboard, they were well stocked with all the food and drinks we could ask for. They provided medications, printed international news feeds, and of course they outfitted us for our excursions to the mainland. The life vests, knee-high boots and water resistant winter pants we had to return, but the In The Spirit of Adventure jackets we got to keep as souvenirs.

The qualifications of the crew were sterling. There were several PhDs in the fields of ornithology, biology and zoology to help identify the wildlife we would be observing, a tenured professor of geology and glaciology to explain the landscape, a Sunday Times Book of the Week author who lectured us about the history of the continent, and even an ex-producer of BBC’s award winning Life on Earth Series starring Sir David Attenborough to take pictures for the commemorative CD they handed everyone at the end of the trip.

They called it an expedition cruise, and if the weather turned sour on us or the seas were unexpectedly choppy and we had to cancel a landing, our expedition leader would tell us with a broad smile, “Things will not always go as planned. This is after all an expedition.” Still, the weather was almost perfect and we had to reschedule only one of our landings.

As for the scenery . . . . how to describe it?

The beauty of this dynamic landscapes resides partly in the fact that it is constantly changing. The continent doubles in size every winter with freezing sea ice and melts back down to half its size every summer. It is a cycle of eternal reinvention. You could come back a year or even a few days later and find a wholly different landscape with the angle of the sun, the constant melting, the shifting floes, the swirling brash ice and the sections of of the coast calving off into the sea.

From sculpted and castellated icebergs to alpine glaciers, and everywhere, everywhere, there was the dazzling reflection off a million frozen mirrors. We were able to walk around among the Gentoo, Chinstrap and Adelie penguin rookeries, observe the scavenging Snowy Sheathbills, and Weddell, Fur and Leopard seals sunning themselves on the floes. As we sailed the Antarctic Tern and Southern Giant Petrel wheeled about our ship above the bucking waves.

Yet even around the Antarctic Peninsula, whose sailing lanes are considered the most accessible, you still have reminders of just how inhospitable this place is. Nearby are landmarks with names like Neptune’s Bellows, Grim Rock, Forbidden Plateau and Exasperation Inlet. I imagined the stories behind these places. Surely their discoveries were not pleasant experiences. I began to think about the cocoon of luxury and safety I floated about in and wondered if I wasn’t missing something . . . .

US VS THEM

When we say that a piece of land was discovered it is a bit of a misnomer. When Christopher Columbus landed in the West Indies and announced that he had “discovered” the new world, I’m sure it was news to the indigenous tribes who were quite certain they were there all along. Antarctica was a different animal altogether. There were no aboriginal inhabitants there - unless you count the Emperor Penguins. Humanity had never set foot on this “soil” when it was first sighted by a British merchant named William Smith in 1819. Up until 200 years ago this really was uncharted territory.

Thus the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration was launched, a roughly 30 year period starting in the late 1800s where the first pioneers explored and charted the Great White Continent using downright primitive modes of transport and no reliable communication technology. As I heard the exploits from our history expert, I couldn’t help but superimpose them against my expierences. A few differences jumped out at me:

Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914-1917.

Shortly after the outbreak of WWI in 1914, Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton set out on the ultimate Antarctic journey - traversing the entire length of the continent from sea to sea, via the pole. Disaster struck when his ship Endurance (inspired by his family’s motto “By Endurance We Conquer”) was trapped and slowly crushed in the pack ice. The irony is that the men endured when the ship did not. 20 months surviving first aboard the trapped ship and later in a series of camps on ice floes.

To rescue his men, Shackleton personally took one of the small lifeboats and used dead reckoning navigation - also known as intelligent guessing - to cross 800 km of icy seas and hurricanes north for 15 days, followed by a 36 hour march across the island of South Georgia, without the aid of a topographical map, to a whaling station at the other end. A relief ship was quickly dispatched for his stranded crew. He didn’t lose a single man under his command.

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Polar Star Expedition of 2008 - Day 3.

Crossing the Drake Passage is no easy feat. The ship is constantly bucking and we have to use the handrails to steady ourselves as we move about the ship. The other day disaster struck while I was moving from cocktail hour in the Observation Lounge to the Dining Hall for dinner (I ordered the roast duck). The ship suddenly listed and I spilled red wine all over my t-shirt. The laundry service on board couldn’t promise anything, but I wouldn’t quit, and kept at them. When the t-shirt was finally returned to my cabin, the stain was gone. My persitence saved the day.

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The Belgica Expedition of 1897-1899.

Led by Adrien Gerlache of the Belgian Navy, this was the first scientific expedition launched to Antarctica. Near Peter I Island the pack ice closed and froze behind them and imprisoned the ship for over a year. They became the first expedition to over-winter in the Antarctic region, and without proper provisions. It took a major effort but they finally managed to cut and blast a channel through 10 foot thick ice and free the ship just before the onset of their 2nd winter. Conditions were so desperate that Gerlache wrote his own will on the trip.

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Polar Star Expedition of 2008 - Day 5.

The Polar Star has internet access via satellite connection. I wanted desperately to use the service to check my emails and get the football scores, but the cost of doing so was very expensive. It took a major effort, but I managed to survive without internet for 11 days. Conditions were so desperate that I wrote an anonymous complaint about the price and dropped it into the Suggestions Box.

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Terra Nova Expedition of 1910–13.

Robert Falcon Scott led a team of 5 in the race for the Pole. Incredibly, they opted to forgo using dogs and actually pulled the sledges themselves. It took them 79 days to reach the South Pole and when they finally arrived on January 17, 1912, they discovered that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen had beaten them to it by a month. On their return journey the entire expedition perished due to a combination of starvation and exposure.

The last entry in Scott’s diary, retrieved after his demise, was written on the 29th of March. It reads, “Since the 21st we have had a continuous gale from W.S.W. and S.W. We had fuel to make two cups of tea apiece and bare food for two days on the 20th (note - this entry was written 9 days later). Every day we have been ready to start for our depot 11 miles away, but outside the door of the tent it remains a scene of whirling drift. I do not think we can hope for any better things now. We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker, of course, and the end cannot be far. It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more.”

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Polar Star Expedition of 2008 - Day 8.

An excerpt from my diary, dated December 18th. It reads, “Since the 13th I have been the continuous companion to a young woman from the Netherlands. Every night we have been ready to start for my cabin but outside of the door she professes stubborn loyalty to her boyfriend back home. I do not think I can hope for any better things now. I shall stick it out to the end, but my pleas are getting weaker, of course, and the end of the cruise cannot be far. It seems a pity, but I do not think I can score.”

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Take a look if you will at a picture of the map Fernando de Magellanes relied on while he was searching for the elusive passage from the North Sea (Atlantic Ocean) to the South Sea (Pacific), the same passage we sailed to reach Antarctica.

No doubt you’ll recognize the coast of Brazil, but little else. This was the best information available at the time. Meanwhile the bridge of the Polar Star has an array of sophisticated navigation technology I can’t even pretend to identify. And as for me personally, when I’m travelling at home I feel naked during a trip to the local mall without out a GPS and a fully charged cell phone.

Yes, times have changed.

REALITY BITES

Of course I can romanticise these periods from the comforting filter of the 21st century. The truth is that The Heroic Age was a time of brutal hardship and the lives of the explorers often ended tragically. The risks were real and still they were enthusiastically sought after by men who knew that stepping aboard a ship could mean stepping into your own tomb. A far cry from my 10 day expedition cruise.

I think that everyone aboard the Polar Star was attuned to this in one way or another. The ship’s doctor confided in me at one point that, from an occupational standpoint, handing out sea sickness pills and Viagra was not all that professionally satisfying. Not when you look at Frederik Cook, the American doctor on The Belgica Expedition who had to improvise and order the crew to eat undercooked seal meat to provide enough Vitamin C to ward off rickets.

But did the good doctor really want to be in Cook’s shoes? Did I want to be in the shoes of the sailor receiving this advice?

AUTHENTIC ANTARCTICA?

So what constitutes an “authentic” Antarctic experience? Does one need to get one’s ship trapped in the ice like Gerlache, hacking and dynamiting their way out just in time? Does one need to almost die of exposure like Shackleton or simply disappear into the icy void like Scott before one can claim to have had an authentic Antarctic encounter?

Arctic exploration is different today. The maps have all been drawn, the ships are all seaworthy, the safety nets and redundancies are all in place. The dangers, while ever-present, have largely been mitigated.

Take note of the below photograph, pilfered from the website of a tour agency specializing in Arctic and Antarctic expeditions:

Starting at around 45 grand you can buy a photo op just like this guy at the North Pole. Not only that, but you can be clean-shaven, well-rested and back at camp in time for your hot catered meal.

A far cry from Otto Nordenskjold and the 5 colleagues of his Swedish Antarctic Expedition of 1901-1904 who spent two winters on Snow Hill Island when their relief ship Antarctic sank. Here we see a picture of some of the team, faces and hands blackened with seal blubber and soot.

In circumstances such as these, losing a few toes or fingers to frostbite were classed as inconveniences, not injuries. They over-wintered in a stone hut they cobbled together and celebrated small victories with the preserving alcohol originally intended for the taxidermy of newly discovered animals.

I wonder if men such as these would have liked to have gained the Pole and stood next to a marker in such a fashion as we do today.

I think not.

Legend has it that to recruit men for one of his expeditions Shackleton placed an advertisement in a London newspaper reading:

“Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success.”

For men like these, the struggle to complete the task was the real draw. If cooking dinner proved to be just as perilous, the odds of success just as remote, no doubt they would have happily lived out the rest of their lives exploring their kitchen cupboards. Yes, I’m quite certain they would have turned up their noses if asked to take part in this “expedition” of mine.

And while I shudder at the thought of becoming that certain class of tourist who hole themselves up in luxury resorts and never actually interact with the local environment, neither do I want an “authentic” Antarctic experience if it means scurvy and frostbite, any more than I would want an authentic Amazonian experience if it means contracting yellow fever.

No, I’m not some salty swab in search of high adventure, signing on as a generally useful hand to any old square rigger heading south. I’m not prepared to live off of penguins for two years in an unheated stone hut when the ship sinks.

Scott in his diary also wrote, “Great God this is an awful place.” I didn’t walk across an expanse of ice for 5 months pulling my own sledge like he did, but I saw the Great White Continent in my own way. I was able to apprehend its danger, but unlike the ill-fated Scott, I was also comfortable and safe enough to appreciate its beauty.

So I do believe that I had an authentic experience, and I took time out each night to raise a toast to the men who blazed a path through the ice . . . only I did it with a pipping hot cup of tea in my hands and my slippered feet resting comfortably in Polar Star’s wooden paneled library.

A jolt is what I needed and a jolt is what I got because I find that I am not ready to quit just yet. Here’s to a New Year filled with new experiences. In the spirit of adventure I renew myself, and I happily press on.

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“I hold that a man should strive to the uttermost for his life’s set prize.”
The Statue and the Bust - Robert Browning

Inscribed on the reverse of Ernest Shackleton’s gravestone

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