LATEST: Saturday Departure for Antarctica looking Good!
South Pole: Solo but Not Alone
Howard Fairbank
Thu 17 Nov 2011 18:08
The good news is that earlier today the Ilyushin left for Antarctica on
its first flight for a while, and with one other flight scheduled before
ours, a Saturday departure is looking very promising! This is not
official yet, but I am really hopeful....
I have just been putting the 4 way points for my course into the two GPS's
I'll be taking along! I must say this together with the Saturday news,
pushed the excitement levels up a few notches....! Yesterday I met up with
three seasoned polar expeditioners, who have done the Messner route, and
we went through their experiences of the dangerous crevasse areas with a
view to me being able to decide on the route I'll take. I had this mixed
feeling of fear and excitement as they spoke through their experiences,
but once again I did feel this sense of “I’ll be OK, I have taken on the
unknown many times before alone, and provided I use my instinct and
experience I’ll be OK!”. The main fear I have is being alone in a whiteout
with crevasse around, but now having rehearsed the situation many times in
my head, I have to just get out there on DEAL WITH IT! And as I often
remind myself, I may never have to, and if Mother Nature feels I have been
a good boy, I’ll ski by these crevasse area in perfect weather giving me
wonderful views of what her huge power at can do! Gee, this is going to
be exciting!
I’ll take you right into the minute detail of my current life here in
Punta Arenas:
Another issue I have been dealing with today is whether to take a large
back pack, the one I used in the North Pole or stick to the much smaller
one I had planned for this expedition. “Gee, why is he still undecided
about these seemingly expedition critical pieces?” Well, yeah it is a
critical, but I know both will do the job, however one will be better than
the other: A lighter sled is easier to pull up inclines / over pressure
ridges etc, and that’s why for the North Pole I used a big back pack: To
make the back breaking job of hauling the sled over the mountainous
pressure ridges a bit easier. Antarctica is different, smoother and while
a climb it’s fairly gentle each day. So the feeling is that one doesn’t
need a backpack and everything goes into the sled, or at most one has a
small backpack for ease of access to ‘stuff’. Well going solo, means my
sled is already heavier than those in a team where team equipment weight,
like stoves, shovel, tent, electronics, fuel etc is shared between team
members, I have to carry it all myself. Secondly, I am planning to use
ski’s that only have fish scales, and not the traditional skins. These are
to provide grip to help one climb and have traction to pull the sled.
Skins defeat the purpose of smooth gliding ski surfaces, and so slow one’s
progress down when skiing is possible. With the fish scales one doesn’t
have as much traction as the skins, but the resistance when wanting to ski
fast is much lower. So the lighter my sled the better, and so the more I
can take in the back pack the better...well to a point, and I’m currently
weighing up that point!! Like I have experienced many times before on
expeditions, one thinks these decisions have been made months before and
put to bed, but as the realities and a bit of fear / apprehension kick in
the decisions get revisited. It’s a fascinating mind game!
At the moment the small one is still ahead on my preference, based on ease
of handling, but how my ski’s perform on the real ice in Antarctica is the
test. I’ll probably wait to see how I feel on the ice in Antarctica before
making the final decision on the backpack.
Gee, and I used to be a big businessman making huge decisions each day,
and now indecisive on something seemingly so insignificant and simple!
It’s because there is little scope for error, and expedition success
depends on all these little details....!
Until then, see My Blog for more details and some hopefully interesting
content.
http://southpolesolohowardfairbank.blogspot.com/