I try and vein to be persuaded that the pole is the seat of frost and desolation. It

ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty and delight. Mary Shelley.

It was the summer of 1914, and Ernest Chackelton was launching his third expedition to the

vast majestic continent of Antarctica. The South Pole had been reached four years previously

by an Norwegian explorer, role Amundsen. It was near in the end of the heroic age of

Antarctic exploration. The First World War swept across the globe. Chackelton felt there

was one more great expedition to be made, a transcontinental crossing of Antarctica from

one side to the other. In his diary he wrote, the first crossing of the Antarctic continent

from sea to sea via the pole, apart from its historic value, will be a journey of great

scientific importance. The distance will be roughly 1800 miles, and the first half of

this from the weddle sea to the pole will be over unknown ground. Every step will be

an advance in geographical science. It will be learned whether the great Victoria chain

of mountains, which has been traced from the Ross Seed to the Pole, extends across the

continent and thus links up, except for the ocean break with the Andes of South America,

and whether the great plateau around the pole dips gradually towards the weddle sea.

With a crew of 28 men, one cat and more than 60 dogs on endurance, a course was set for

the coast of Antarctica, and the starting point for the trans-antatic expedition.

But soon, Dixplorers found themselves navigating a sharp jigsaw of icebergs and flows. The

weddle sea is notorious for dangerous pack ice that can stretch for a million square miles.

The wailers of South Georgia, the last stop before the Antarctic, had worn Chackelton

of the perils of the weddle sea. But he was restless, determined, running from debt,

and he pressed onward.

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