Day 27

Patience has become the watchword as we try and figure a way through all the crevasses, meltwater channels and treacherous slopes that surround us. Even with the drone flying it’s hard to map a route with certainty and physical recces are the only way to be sure of the going underfoot. We have to balance progress towards our goal with managing the risk sensibly. It’s a slow but necessary process; no one wants to be dangling in a crevasse with 90kg of pulk following right behind them.

Last night’s recce proved fruitful and the crevasse field we had to cross was tough but manageable and the melt water channels still frozen in the early morning chill. Inevitably we were presented with another choice of options to get up onto what we hoped would be the icecap proper, none of them good. To the left the slope looked good but with some monster crevasses near the top a dead give-away for a very steep and potentially dangerous final climb. In the centre the climb looked clear of crevasses but steep and unrelenting with no clear summit in sight, and to the right we faced a long back track over a large crevasse field and a rapidly thawing meltwater lake…..

We opted for straight up the middle with a bit of blind hope that the slope would actually be less steep that it appeared from our current vantage point. In this environment distances and slopes seem almost impossible to judge accurately as the last few days had taught us several times. In this case we were relieved to see the slope angle appearing to diminish as we approached. It was less that we feared but still a big undertaking and too steep for double pulks.

Dropping our second pulk off at the bottom of the hill we surged forward with renewed energy, vigour that evaporated after the first 5 mins of climbing. The hill seemed to go on forever but finally we got to a reasonably level spot… at the edge of another crevasse field! I was beginning to feel we would never reach the ice cap itself. A ‘quick’ nip down to drag up the second pulk and we were all starting to feel the effects of all the ascent.

Finally, after another hour pulling over some relatively benign crevasses we crested a slope into a white wilderness that stretched on into the far distance without break. We had made it to the icecap proper. Morale soared, as did the distances we could cover over the ground as we finally ditched crampons and ropes and switched back to skis. Camp established with our last views of the tops of a few scattered mountains, tomorrow is our first full day of pulling across the icecap.