D10: Hey man, today was the toughest yet...but yippee the pole was perfect!
South Pole: Solo but Not Alone
Howard Fairbank
Fri 2 Dec 2011 06:43
It may seem like I'm dramatising each day being the toughest yet, but today is way ahead,mand hopefully won't ever be challenged for the spot!
Firstly, I was worried about the pole repair, and secondly the last two hours of yesterday had deepish snow (ie not ice) and my sled just sunk like a plough in it, making for real slow going, and I wondered if this would be the samee today? Those that know me well, know I hate 'slowness', and I find dropping daily distance below my plan very personally challenging and bad forr my morale!
Well, the great news is the pole repair lasted (at least one day!) but I gained a lot of confidence in the repair, because today was a 'full on' pole stress day! I also now feel comfortable I can shorten the pole and repeat the repair if need be.
Now that snow! Well it was horendous....I do remember one of the guys from ALE telling me that,that big storm and unseasonal snow dump had made for tough sledding condions on the Messner aad Hercules Inlet routes...Hmmm, I think I'm experiencing it. I could see that there were feww sastruggi, but as I looked closer the sastruggi was hidden by the 'fresh' snow covering! Snow only turns to ice with time, cold and wind, and this hasn't had enough of any of them...
Gee, the going was REAL tough, one hour I managed less than 2km an hour, after being up at 3-3.4's over days before. Not only was the speed down, the effor to drag the sled though this went up inversely exponentially to the speed! I no longer haad a sled, but rather a plough. What use is a plough on this all white continent?? My sled wasn't designed for softt snow, unlike some which have a boat like v shape which gives more support area as it sinks in. The result was that I often hadd to unclip myself from the sled and go back and manually lug it out of deep snow. I can tell you, no matter if you were the best snow sled puller in the world, you would have struggled to fighht off demoralisation. At one point two hours into the day I 'sat' myself dowwn for a serious chat! I had to give myeslf a bollicking for how I was dealing with the dilema, and tell myself it wass just about "taking one hour at a time", and forget the 30km a day goal, forget thee South Pole, all I had to do was stick to the task for 1 single hour at a time, and whateever distance I do for the day is a good one, as long as I did the quailty hoyr by hour. Hey it wadn't an easy chat! (this is why these challeenges are so personally insightful....)
So that's what I did...but 'Mother Nature, decided the snow chlllen wasn't enough: Going from a clear blue sky, coldish, moderate headwind start, I saw the foog slowly drift in, as the wind dropped. Soon I was iin complete dull white out, where there was no horizon and no visibilty beyond 20 metres in front of me! So theere I was, all on my own ploughing a huge ice pasture in Antarctica, and unable too see where I was going, and using a huge amount of energy to do it! Now does that sound like a productive day's work? Well, not wanting to have any more one on one chsts with myself, I forced myself to 'plough on', and ended the day with a credible 24km on the scoreboard!
I must say in the changing faces of Antarctica today, there were some very special scenes, combining the sky, clouds, fog babk, and then the ice (snow!) surface. At one point it really looked like I was walking towards an angry green / grey sea, with the shadows and reflections. Also still every day I stop often and just take in this truly amazing 360 degree horizon vista.
I am apprehensive about making the Pole on my 38 day supply and today went through a plan to 'up the ante' if neeee bee and when I'd need to push that buttton. In this slow world of polar expeditions, one can't create miraacles overnight, so proacting is key. It's too early yet, and I'll se how this next 7 days pans out. I've been so liberally rewarding myself for good performance,each day, I'm most worried about the whisky running out!
Oopsie, I hear the wind picking up outside....! In the last half hour a marching today the snow reduced ddramatically, so I'mm hoping it's beehind me and I can get those daily averages back up to near 30km. I guess I'm in fates hands.
Right, earlly to bed tonight....Oh, re dreams: I'm so tired I just sleep 'vacant'...nothing!!
Lastly, thanks for all the great support, Dominique sends through a summary of comments, emails....It's really helps me a LOT, I mean that! It's also totally OK if you just read and enjoy..so no pressure ok, we are hopefully ALL having fun in our own way!
Bye for today....I seee its now December!
H