Day 17: Back at work, and a day of 'everything'....
South Pole: Solo but Not Alone
Howard Fairbank
Fri 9 Dec 2011 01:11
Elevation: 1470 metres
Under 500km to go: 487, to be exact!
After the variety and excitement of yesterday, I had sort of prepared myself for getting back to the harsh realities of pounding my way direct to the Pole! The rigors of the 2hr, 1.5hr, 1.5hr, 1.5hr, 1.5hr, 1hr, 1hr (last hour optional!) the mucch looked forward to but bittterly cold 10 minute breaks, spent huddled behind my sled, and then the 'getting started again' process, putting skis, and backpack back on, and starting the warm up process. Its a ful on routine, that varies depending only on the weather, terrrain, and what layers of clothing I have on.
It may seem mindless, but it requires focus, concentration and a good sense of understanding of one's body and how it deals with the cold.
When all goes well, and everything is in tune, I lapse into this form of trance, where my focus moves automatically between the compass, a distant sastruggi 'beacon', add a point 1-2 metres on the ice infront of me. These three sources of information are scanned subconcuiously, processed and micro adjustments to course, weight bias, and foot movement so I effortlesly cross the uneven terrain, but in a line as straight as an arrow, on the desired compass course, and as fast as possible....! I'm on autopilot, and at one with the environment, myy mind is sort of void,, but flipping through non conceptual things, often bringing up thoughts about you guys...but all nice and peaceful... In this space, the kilometres fly by, time is irrelevant, at the break when I look back the sled tracks are straight as an arrow disappearing into tye rear horizzon, annd the GPS confirm that the courrse andd speed were 'perfect'!
My brother-in-law, Bob, a respected sports psychologist, who makes quite a few comments on the blog, would say, "I'm in the zone". This is the place I desire to be in, for the 10 marching hourrs of the day, but it's not always easy...
So much out here contributes to being able to get in this zone. Being too hot or too cold makes it impossible, lots of sastruggi obstacles, calorie stores, equipment / clothing issues / irritations, and maybe most importantly my frame of mind, are the main doors / barriers to entering to 'the zone'.
Well today, was a day with lots a different weather, from clear skies, a bitterly cold headwind, still, flat light greyness, to a valley hole that was windless, and felt as hot as Death Valley! This all requires lots of clothing layer changes, which makes it hard to be rreelaxed and enter the zone, I was pretty restless, aand tryiing to delay layer changes in the hope I won't need it often took me close to being too cold and 'worried'... At one point I was walking with my wind pant leggings rolled up, with 'skinny' black underwear only legs sticking out to keep cool. Too hot is almost as bad as too cold. At another time I had three layers of gloves, full windsuit with my face wrapped in ruff, and just being warm enough. Given all this change and the difficulty of getting into the zone, I was pleased with the days distance.
I am still concerned about my right foot: about 7-8 hours into the day, I get excruitiating pain, and am busy working thriough some options..... This pain certainly does make entering the zone easy! Anyway, nobody said it would be easy skiiing to the Pole!
I'm reckoning on another 20 days out here, which basically means I musn't think about that, and just get on with the now, and enjoying being out here, like I have been. Yesterday's excursion was good confirmation to me that I'm fully entrenched with life in this Antarctic environment, so that's good!
Finally, its great to yave a few school classes along: BJHS, ESL class are doing their usual amazingg stuff, and a big welcome to Ranch Bernado sudents...I wonder how many of you have experienced cold, snow and ice?? Remember school can bee a huge personal adventure, you jus need to set your 'South Pole' goals for you for school and then grab the oportunities school provides to reach your school 'South Pole'. It's not your teacher's adventure, it''s yours, just like this one is mine, for me!
Lastly, I hope you guys also take the opportunity to learn about Antarctica, it's such an important place to our earth and us humans in so many respects. Explore, learn about it, and then you can help protect it for the future.....
That's all today...hopefully I'll be back to 'normal' tomorrow..!