South Pole and Vinson

Following in Roald Amundsen’s footsteps skiing up the remote, challenging and highly crevassed Axel Heiberg glacier to the South Pole

Join me live on my journey to the South Pole

South Pole & Mt. Vinson

At the time of this writing, on November 15, 2021, I am in Punta Arenas, Chile, one of the southernmost cities in the world. (See the gallery below for a map of where Punta Arenas is located). From here, I will fly to Union Glacier Camp in Antarctica. I don’t know what that plane will look like yet, but I can’t wait to find out. Once I get to Union Glacier, I will spend a few days there training, preparing and practicing our systems before the full expedition begins.

As soon as we get an open weather window, we will then fly from Union Glacier Camp to the base of the Axel Heiberg Glacier on the Ross Ice Shelf (see the gallery for a map of Antarctica and where our start point will be). Once we reach the start point, we will then spend 30-40 days skiing up the Axel Heiberg glacier to the bottom of the world.

With a team of 3 other polar explorers, I will be following in the footsteps of Roald Amundsen, the first man to reach the South Pole. We will be navigating through a maze of crevasses known as the Devil’s Ballroom and walking on a spot of land that only 49 other human beings have ever set foot on.

Upon reaching the South Pole, a plane will pick us up and we will fly back to Union Glacier Camp. There, I will rest for a few days before flying to the base camp of Mt. Vinson to climb the tallest mountain in Antarctica.

All in all, I will be spending about 2 months in the coldest, driest and windiest continent on Earth.

I am beyond excited to see what doors this expedition will open within my soul…

(This description about the expedition will be updated once I complete the journey.)

Expedition Journey

This is the planned route for this expedition. The map above shows where I am currently located in real time…

South Pole Journal

(Coming soon)

31 – Why do we fall?

While recovering and waiting, I’ve been reading polar books, chatting with other explorers here and had a logistics talk with a member of the ALE team. All to start working towards the big expedition everything I am doing now is leading up to… And holy shit! For starters, this is physically, mentally and spiritually demanding at a level that borders on the absurd, much more so than even I could have imagined. In addition to that, it is an extremely daunting logistical challenge as well

30 – The toughest challenge with frostbite

chomping at the bit to get back out again. From time to time, I find myself thinking, maybe I could still do the North Pole. But no, I absolutely cannot 🙂 Not with how black my 2 fingers got.

29 – What I am most proud of…

While I am a bit disappointed from time to time, overall I’m in great spirits and the plan hasn’t changed one bit. All that’s changed is the timeline. I may not have reached the South Pole this time, but I will be back and am still damn proud of what I did achieve out there…

28 – The worst part about being evacuated early

It’s been challenging and humbling readjusting to life being unable to use these 3 fingers. I can’t put any pressure on them at all or they will get worst. So everything is taking a bit more time to do than it usually would.

27 – I owe a debt of gratitude

I feel immense gratitude to be surrounded by such amazing human beings. These men and women who all looked out for me in the last couple of days are a testament to the human spirit at its finest.

26 – My trip is over…

The call was then made for me to be evacuated. Right now I believe they can still heal. But the doctor said if I expose these fingers to the cold any more, I’d lose them.

25 – I am the storm

We woke up this morning to the wind continuing to hammer our tent. The temperatures dropped and the wind got even stronger. It was too dangerous for us to move, so now we’re tent bound for another day.

24 – An intense 1st day on the plateau

We woke up this morning to 25-30 knot winds hammering our tent. The extreme wind was less than ideal, but we thought we’d give it a shot and get moving. It did not go well…

23 – We did it!

110 years ago today, Roald Amundsen became the first person ever to reach the South Pole. He pioneered a new route from the Bay of Whales up the Axel Heiberg glacier to the Pole. And today, 110 years later, following in his legendary footsteps, we have successfully climbed the Axel Heiberg glacier. It is a special feeling to have done it on this very momentous day in polar history…

22 – Standing by for the sun

We got to the base of the climb after 1 shift of skiing. I was super excited and about to go back into my “cage.” Then suddenly the clouds swarmed in around us… We are now back in our tent, it is snowing outside and we’re in a whiteout. On the plateau, it would be fine to move in these conditions. But we can’t move up the crevassed glacier with zero visibility.

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