Not unlike Bear Grylls, Brit Ben Saunders is a self-described “Adventurer, Athlete, and Motivational Speaker.” Unlike Bear, he’s got an uber-slick website and accompanying blog peppered with the humble, experienced writings one might expect from a person crazy and driven enough to ski to the North Pole – alone.
His About page describes him thusly:
Ben Saunders is a record-breaking long-distance skier, with three North Pole expeditions under his belt. He is the youngest person ever to ski solo to the North Pole and holds the record for the longest solo Arctic journey by a Briton. Since 2001, Ben has skied more than 2,500km (1,500 miles), which he recently worked out equates to two percent of his entire life living in a tent in the high Arctic. Not one to rest on his laurels, Ben is currently preparing for two groundbreaking polar expeditions starting in 2008, one of which will be the longest unsupported polar journey in history.
His work on the Serco Transarctic Expedition is chronicled here, particularly field dispatches spanning five months and including the lead-up to his journey, the expedition itself, and a “post-mortem” of sorts. In short:
On 5 March, Ben Saunders set out to ski solo more than 1,200 miles across the Arctic from the Russian edge of the arctic ice pack to Canada via the North Geographic Pole.
In the weeks that followed Ben experienced what NASA called ‘the worst conditions on record’. Of the four solo expeditions that started out that year, one died and two were rescued suffering from frostbite and injuries. Ben was the only solo expedition to make it to the North Pole and in doing so set a world record; he is by far the youngest person to reach the North Pole solo.
Ben continued on towards Canada, but conditions worsened and he was told by his expedition team that he would have to be picked up. Despite not being able to reach Canada, Ben set another British record for the longest solo arctic trek, skiing more than 1,000km in treacherous conditions.
Very cool stuff.
In this fascinating and pretty damn funny video (below), Ben describes visiting the geographic North Pole and being the only person within an area one and a half times the size of the United States. He found that there is in fact no pole at the North Pole and to prove that he actually reached his destination, he has but one grainy photo of his Garmin GPS reading exactly 90 degrees (illustrating that he was smack on the Pole). Further, given that epic adventurer Reinhold Messner described the journey Ben undertook as 10 times more dangerous than climbing Mount Everest, Ben also expounds upon the all-important question: “Why the hell do it in the first place?”
“I specialize in dragging heavy things around cold places.” A bit of an understatement, don’t you think?
(More Ben Saunders videos)