1st January
88.5326S,081.3476W
Camp Shackleton, our hero.
Shackletons 97 miles from the pole. He turned, we continue to fulfill a dream.
New years day was no different then any other, except that today we would be as far as Shackleton got, to within 97 miles of the pole from the east of Antarctic, we would be the same distance from the pole from the west.
Now that we have passed this point, I’m feeling more confident that we will reach the Pole. There were lots of times on this expeditiin that I had my doubts if we would get there.
We had terrible weather, serious injuries and soft snow that has made our journey harder. However there was a verse my mother gave me many years ago that I have written in the tent just above my head that kept me focus on the objectives of the expedition and it reads.
Don’t quit.
When time are tough as they sometimes will and the road you trudging seems all up hill…. Rest if you must, but don’t you quit….
Success is failure turned inside out..it may seem far but be so near. So stick to the fight when your hardest hit. Because it’s when times go tough, that you must not quit.
So, this verse kept me focused on the objectives we have and now we are within 160 km of the pole. Tomorrow we will have skied over a 1000 km from the coast.
So success seems now to be within reach, cross fingers, no more bad weather or serious injuries.
happy new year to all…. Clare, Shaun, Jon and myself…,, As the Shackleton moto goes…. ‘By endurance we conquer’....
Historical information:
On January 9th 1909 after enduring endless days of dehydration, hunger and near hypothermia on the glacier Shackleton and his team of Frank Wild, John Boyd Adams and Eric Marshall established a new ‘furthest south’. (Shackleton would name it the Beardmore Glacier in honour of the Scottish industrialist who had helped finance the Nimrod expedition.)
Standing at only 97 miles from the South Pole the latitude was 88 degrees and 23 minutes- the team had extended Scott’s record by 6 whole degrees of latitude. Most importantly the team had essentially proven that the South Pole lay up on the ice cap that had been discovered by Albert Armitage- Shackleton’s old friend from the discovery days- six years earlier.
More info available on our history page
