No Going Back

I can’t quite believe that this is really happening, but there’s no going back now! Today I went to the bank to pay the final balance to the Antarctic logistics company, plus the flights are booked. Our tiny team of Conrad (the arctic guide) and myself will be flying via Madrid and Santiago to arrive in Punta Arenas after more than 24 hours travelling, before going on to Antarctica three days later. 

When we get there, after landing on an ice runway, we’ll spend some time acclimatising to the cold – the coldest ever recorded temperature is -89 degrees – but we’ll have the relative luxury of a permanent tent for the night and even a heated mess tent! Not for long though, after a practice 2 day expedition we will pack up our 50kg each of kit and food and get taken to the start point of our expedition… 222 long, cold kilometres away from the pole. 

I've just been looking up some facts about Antarctica to share with you all (for example...did you know that there’s no time at the poles because there’s no longitude… so you can choose your own time zone?) and I've found out that Antarctica is “the largest, coldest, driest, and windiest desert on Earth”. Suddenly it sounds rather scary! However, training is going very well and my next post will be about the Great Langdale half marathon, where I managed to get a few photos. 

not so scary after all...penguins on Antarctica