Call of the White (18 page)

While we worked, the ALE doctor called on us. I'd first met him at Santiago airport when he'd come over to introduce himself (dressed in our polar clothing we were easily spotted). The first thing he'd said to me was, ‘We see teams come down year after year and we watch them all make the same mistakes.' He went on to list some of the most common errors and I was pleased that none of them applied to us, but his comment had put me on the defensive. I'd worked tirelessly for two years to get as much advice as I could, including from ALE, to make sure we were as prepared as possible and yet the doctor seemed to have already decided that we were just like all the others and that there was little hope for us. I realised that from ALE's point of view our team represented something of a risk. Antarctica is a dangerous place and I was bringing a team of novices with less than a year's training to complete a journey that teams much more experienced and physically stronger than us had failed to complete safely. ALE were not responsible for us on the ice – we were a private expedition for which they were providing logistical support – but if we came to harm they would inevitably be called to account. For this reason they are stringent about which expeditions they transport to Antarctica and would be well within their right to refuse to take an expedition that they felt was unsafe or unprepared. I didn't want to give ALE any reason to doubt us.

The doctor had called on us at the hostel to go through our first aid kits. Before he left he looked through the nutritional breakdown of our rations and was concerned. It is a standard rule of thumb that someone on a demanding polar expedition will need at least 4,500 calories a day, increasing to around 5,000 calories by the end of the journey. Our rations provided 4,300 calories at the start, increasing to around 4,600 calories for the second half of the expedition. I knew this was less than usual but then our team was significantly smaller, physically, than average. During our training in Norway and New Zealand it was clear that some team members were incapable of ingesting any more than this. Once the doctor had left I thought hard about our rations and whether they needed to be changed. I am always careful not to let my own ego or pride get in the way of making good decisions. In this case, even after objectively re-examining my calculations, I was still confident that our rations were the best they could be for our team.

The team was to go to the ALE office the next day to talk about our expedition. Steve Jones, my main contact at ALE, would be running the meeting and, although he had been a very supportive friend over the last year, I knew that he was now wearing his ALE hat. He would need to know every detail of our preparations, from kit to rations, in order to satisfy himself that we were ready. As I gathered papers and documents for the meeting, I couldn't help but feel as if I was preparing for an exam. Steve would be exacting and thorough, and I needed to prove that my team was prepared.

We filed into the ALE office and were shown into a bright and airy lounge. The girls rapidly planted themselves on the inviting sofas lining the room, sprawling like teenagers, while Steve sat on a chair in the middle. He talked through every aspect of our expedition, from our expectations and training to the make and model of our stoves and satellite phones. Steve's main area of concern seemed to be our plans to remove our human waste throughout the expedition. ALE already insisted that expeditions remove their human waste from within the last degree of latitude surrounding the South Pole, as this is where there is the greatest concentration of activity. No one had yet tried doing the same for the duration of an entire expedition from the edge of the continent to the pole. Steve expressed his doubts. ‘This is already a huge challenge, so I don't see the sense in making it unnecessarily harder for yourselves.' We had no idea how much waste we would accumulate and therefore how much extra weight this decision would add to our loads.

I tried to reassure Steve with the same logic I had used on myself. ‘If it gets too heavy we'll just stop collecting it. If we only manage to remove our waste for part of the way before it gets too heavy, then surely that's better than nothing and at least we will have learnt about the sort of weights involved. At the moment no one knows.' Steve looked unimpressed. He clearly thought it was an act of foolishness on my part.

Seeing that I wasn't willing to back down, he moved on to another area of concern. As a result of the team's training in New Zealand, we had opted for one resupply of food and fuel to be left on the ice for us by plane. We would also be able to leave rubbish at this depot to be collected later in the season. ALE's own guided expeditions have a second, additional resupply closer to the South Pole and Steve was keen for us to do the same. The decision to have any support at all had been difficult for me but a second resupply seemed like a step too far. We wouldn't need it, I was sure of it. The discussions with Steve went on long into the afternoon. ALE warned me about the difficulties of travelling with a larger group, about the likelihood of the women spreading out. I listened carefully to their advice but as much as I was wary of being over-confident I couldn't help but feel frustrated. I didn't feel that I was being given much credit for knowing what I was doing. We had trained as a team and put systems in place to avoid such dangers. Separation was one of my worst fears and so we always travelled ski-tip to sledge-back, leaving no possibility for the team to spread out. I was confident in our team's preparation and any departure from the accepted wisdom had been deliberate and careful.

With just days to go until our scheduled departure, we laid out all the equipment that was coming with us to Antarctica in the garage behind the hostel and streamlined wherever we could to reduce weight. I was determined that we would be as lightweight as possible and went through our equipment repeatedly to root out any unnecessary spares or luxury items. Rather than each team member having their own penknife, journal, pencil, GPS, compass, camera, moisturiser, supply of wet wipes and toothpaste, we shared these items as a team. Personal luxuries such as books, good luck mascots and Christmas paraphernalia were banned as were any well-meaning ‘surprise' gifts for the team. Most of the women were happy to go along with my weight-saving rules but there was some resistance as I sifted through each team member's personal items. Sophia and Reena had each packed two hats and were reluctant to leave one behind; Steph grumbled as I made her remove the wet wipes that were included with each of her sanitary towels and Kylie was disappointed when I asked her not to take the small Christmas presents that she had secretly brought for everyone. I felt like a killjoy but if I allowed Kylie to bring gifts then everyone would bring something for Christmas and before we knew it we'd have fake Christmas trees and frozen turkey slices being tucked away in our baggage, adding considerably to our loads.

I knew that the girls all thought I was unnecessarily obsessed with weight and didn't understand my seemingly pedantic, minimalist approach but I knew what it was like to pull a sledge for six weeks; I knew we would spend day after day thinking about what was in the sledge and agonise over whether every item was strictly necessary; to be desperate to identify anything, however small, that could be left behind just to reduce the weight, even if only infinitesimally. I knew that by the end of the expedition, they would understand my obsession.

Each evening, we spent a lot of time sewing. The upstairs landing resembled a sewing circle as we made ourselves comfortable round the electric fire surrounded by spare material, boxes of needles and rolls of thread. We each had almost identical clothing that needed to be colour-coded so that we knew which was ours and also had to be adapted for our own personal needs and preferences. Some cut extra holes in the balaclavas we used to cover our faces so that they could breathe more easily while others sewed pleats in the fabric so that it was a closer fit. Some made thumb-holes in the sleeves of their thermal tops to keep their wrists warm while others made ‘wristies' from fleece scraps or old socks. We chatted as we sewed and although it was often the early hours before we all turned in, the sewing circle was the most relaxing part of our day.

I tried to make sure that we didn't work ourselves into the ground, that everybody got enough sleep and enough to eat so that they arrived in Antarctica fit and rested rather than stressed and exhausted, but there was a nervous energy in the team that caused mistakes to be made, mistakes that we couldn't afford. Kim came to see me in the hostel with a broken stove pump in her hand. She had been a little overenthusiastic when testing a stove and snapped part of the plastic pump, rendering our spare stove useless. I was exasperated at her carelessness but calmed myself with the thought that we could probably find a replacement in Punta. Shortly afterward Steph went into Punta wearing her windproof expedition smock and – within 100 yards of the hostel – had lost it.

‘I'm sorry, Felicity. I've looked everywhere but it's gone,' she apologised.

I was furious. There was no way she could ski to the South Pole without her windproof and we didn't have spares. Each team member wore the same branded equipment so, even if we found a similar jacket in Punta, it would impact the branding of the team and our precious sponsorship. ‘Well, you can't come to Antarctica without it,' I snapped. ‘So you'd better get out there and find it.'

She spent the rest of the day despondently pacing the streets around the hostel looking for any sign of her bright red jacket. She asked in cafes and shops if anyone had seen it and found a man who thought he'd seen something red blowing towards the sea. I noticed the look of sympathy in the eyes of the rest of the team. They thought I was being unnecessarily harsh. Steph was clearly devastated and losing the smock had been a genuine mistake – but I saw it as a symptom of a worrying trend within the team.

Each member undoubtedly cared about our expedition and was undeniably trying hard, but something was missing. The team didn't quite appreciate the seriousness of what we were about to do. To them it was still a game; it wasn't real. I felt partly responsible for this attitude because in Norway we had looked after everyone as if it was a school trip. If someone lost an item, we found them a replacement; if they came to us with a problem, we solved it. In Antarctica I couldn't look after everyone all of the time. The women would have to take responsibility for themselves.

As the light faded, I sent someone out to fetch Steph and bring her back to the hostel. When she arrived I gathered the team together in the breakfast room. I sighed inwardly, feeling like a headmistress. I talked about the consequences of the broken stove and the lost jacket, adding drama to emphasize the point. ‘I know you think I am being harsh but Antarctica will be far less forgiving if we make these kinds of mistakes during the expedition. In Antarctica there are no second chances. I know you feel terribly sorry now – but it is too late, the damage has already been done. I want you to remember how sorry you feel right now and use it to stop you making mistakes. Imagine how awful you would feel if you make a mistake in Antarctica that sends the expedition home, a mistake that stops us reaching the South Pole. Use that thought to scare yourself into being more careful and more conscientious than you have ever been in your life. Every time you are tempted to cut a corner or rush a job – and believe me, when you are cold and tired, you will be tempted – remember how awful you feel now and use it to make yourself go that extra mile. I need you all to feel sorry before you make a mistake, not after.' There was a glum silence and I was tempted to lighten the mood, to focus on how well we were doing, but I fought the instinct. I needed this message to sink in.

The doctor from ALE called. He had offered to give the team a talk
about cold injuries. The women had been taught about symptoms and prevention of cold injuries repeatedly by a number of different experts but I didn't see that hearing it once more would do any harm. The girls sat around the doctor's laptop in the breakfast room of the hostel as he went through the basics and showed pictures of hideous injuries suffered by previous expeditions. I watched the girls carefully and saw the faint glimmer of panic grow on their faces. They started to ask questions that I knew they already had the answers to but were asking out of nervous fear. As the questions got more basic I could see the concern grow in the doctor. He shot me a number of alarmed glances and I wondered what would be reported back to Steve. I finally interrupted the session, ‘Guys, this is all really valuable information but you can't let yourselves panic. This is all information you've had since your first day in Norway. You not only know this stuff but you have put it into practice in both Norway and New Zealand. None of you came away with any kind of injury. All you need to do is keep doing what you have been doing and you are all going to be fine.'

‘Yes, there's no need to panic,' agreed the doctor, ‘But Antarctica is very different to Norway or New Zealand. We get teams down here who have been to Greenland and think that means they know it all. Antarctica is dangerous and you mustn't let your guard down for a second.'

He was right of course but scaring the team at this eleventh hour wasn't going to make them more careful, it was just going to make them panic. I didn't want to appear flippant but neither did I want my team petrified of leaving the tent.

That evening everyone put on all their Antarctic clothing and I gave them a military-style inspection to make sure that vital adjustments had been done, such as sewing fleece onto the bottom of goggles to protect the nose, tying tabs onto zips to make them easier to pull when wearing mitts, and the all-important colour coding. All these tiny details seemed so insignificant and yet in Antarctica I knew they would take on critical importance.