Choose to fight!Vegard’s children have inscribed a greeting on his bowl. It says “Choose to fight, Daddy!” Today we have all fought. We gave ourselves two extra hours this morning, hoping that the wind would die down. It didn’t. We set off in zero visibility and thick driving snow, with gale force winds in our faces. After a few hours of what felt like floating weightlessly in a featureless white ball of cotton, Vegard decided the wind would permit sailing. The veteran ski-sailors Vegard and Harald Dag would tow Stein and Jan-Gunnar.
“We had violent gusts of wind during the night. Quite calm until the small hours. Gale from ESE true until midday with thick drift.”– Amundsen on this day 100 years ago (Read more …) 
“Poof!” Suddenly the wind filled Vegard’s spinnaker. He flew skywards like a human cannonball until his anchor (two sleds and one Winther) jerked him back to earth as quickly as he had left it. Skis, lines, and goggles had a somewhat different distribution than before the detonation. “The wind is too strong,” yelled Vegard through the gusts. “We’ll have to use the small sails.” Shortly after, Ulvang, Winther and two sleds disappeared in the wake of a flapping sheet of nylon. So we packed up and we all continued onward on skis, like an ordinary expedition to the South Pole. But Runa and Nora should know that their father has obeyed the injunction they put on his bowl. Position: S 84 37.443, W 163 03.982
Temperature: -7°C Wind: 8–12 m/s from the southeast Distance traversed: 19 km Distance behind Amundsen: 166 km Total distance traversed: 638 km Distance remaining to the South Pole: 672 km Did you know that some traces Roald Amundsen left in Antarctica can still be seen?
On a continent that is 98% solid ice it isn’t easy to leave tracks, but there are 80 cultural heritage sites on the official list of historic places and mounuments in Antarctica, and 11 of them are Norwegian. |
South Pole 1911–2011 is an informational outreach project run by the Norwegian Polar Institute
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