Amundsen takes a moment to catch his breath. From this vantage point the Fram appears a dark speck, Framheim a slightly larger smudge due to the nearsightedness Amundsen refuses to acknowledge. Turning from the Bay of Whales, he focuses his attention on what lies before him – the unknown continent. His smile is infectious. Prestrud, Johansen and Helmer grin back.
‘What are you waiting for?’ he calls to Prestrud. ‘Lead on!’
Prestrud sets off in a southerly direction, his long narrow skis moving effortlessly across the hard-packed surface. Helmer gives him a five-minute head start before urging his dogs to follow across the empty plain. The other two teams are keen to get going but Johansen is careful to leave a distance of a hundred metres or so between his six dogs and Helmer’s. Any man who has experienced the headache of untangling two dog teams engaged in an all-out war will know that it’s easier to avoid conflict than resolve it. Finally, Amundsen readies his dogs and sets them after the other teams, each of them ably hauling 250 kilograms of supplies towards the unresolved horizon. The chief checks the distance-meter, a wheel extending behind his sledge that will keep count of the kilometres they cover. It turns again and again, its steady accumulation of metres proof of their progress in a banal white landscape devoid of natural features or points of reference. His thoughts travel widely, but his eyes remain trained on the unbroken tracks extending before him. It’s only a matter of time before he’ll need to scoop up some article dropped by somebody up ahead.
‘A little to the right!’ shouts Helmer.
Prestrud alters his course slightly without responding. Nobody envies his job. It is tedious, lonely and psychologically taxing to act as a ‘forerunner’, providing something for the dogs to follow in the otherwise blank scene.
‘A little to the left!’ shouts Helmer.
Prestrud turns abruptly. Even without seeing his expression clearly, Helmer knows the filthy look directed back at him. He points in an exaggerated manner at his compass. How can he help it if Prestrud deviates from their southerly bearing? He should count himself lucky. Keeping an eye on a team of dogs is far trickier, figuring out who’s working and who’s shirking, and keeping the sledge from capsizing on the uneven terrain. Helmer checks his compass and mutters in exasperation. Once again he shouts: ‘A little to the right.’
Prestrud focuses on the rhythmic sound his skis make on the thin layer of loose snow. He is the first ever human being to make tracks here. It’s a nice thought, but is it enough to keep him going over hours, days and weeks of monotony?
The four men proceed at a rattling pace. Snow conditions are perfect and the dogs are performing well. But even though the weather is calm and mild, soon a grey haze settles around them, causing everything to appear flat and the land and sky to merge into blankness. The effect is disorientating and snow goggles provide little relief. With no shadows to indicate contours in the white surface, something as simple as keeping upright becomes a great challenge. Prestrud tips over time and again. He feels foolish, even though the others stumble too, momentarily caught off guard by an imperceptible hump or hollow. At least they’re able to grab hold of a sledge and steady themselves. Prestrud is sick of scrambling to his feet.
The men pitch camp late in the afternoon, satisfied with the 15 kilometres they’ve travelled since their 9.30 departure. Two tents, each accommodating two men, spring up in the white while the dogs settle down in the snow, delighting in their blocks of frozen fish meal and fat.
Inside one of the tents, Amundsen and Helmer start the evening’s food preparations. There’s a knack to lighting the Primus burner and it takes Amundsen a few minutes to get the paraffin flowing in the cold. Meanwhile, Helmer has loaded up the Nansen cooker with snow, whistling a cheerful tune as he works. The cooker has two parts – an inner chamber for cooking the meal and an outer chamber for melting snow to make hot chocolate. Once the snow has melted in the inner chamber, Helmer stirs in a crumbled block of pemmican. Only a few stirs and the dried meat and fat melt into the boiling water. Dinner is served. They won’t all eat together. There’s not enough room. Johansen and Prestrud will need to scuttle into the other tent and eat before the warming effect is lost to the surrounding chill.
The cooker has warmed the air in Amundsen and Helmer’s tent, for a time at least. Both men have removed their boots and stripped off their heavy outer layers, which hasn’t been easy in such a confined space. Dinnertime conversation is confined to tired grunts. Wriggling down into their reindeer sleeping bags feels like the ultimate luxury, despite still being clad in a full set of clothes. Feet and hands are covered and a hood is drawn tight over their heads. The temperature outside is a brisk minus seven.
Amundsen wakes. He lies there blinking for a moment, his eyes trying to focus on the white fabric overhead. All this daylight. Where am I? His breath clouds, complicating things. Helmer is snoring – back to his old tricks. The noise brings Amundsen back to the two-man tent, to depot-laying, to Antarctica.
‘Helmer!’ Amundsen fumbles with the drawstring under his chin, releasing his head. Frigid air floods into his sleeping bag, chasing the remnants of sleep from his system. With the efficiency that comes from years of practice Amundsen pulls his reindeer-skin anorak on over his head, slips his legs from the bag and into his reindeer trousers and guides his feet into his fur kamiks. ‘Helmer Hansen!’ he shouts.
The snoring continues unabated. Amundsen unfastens the tent flap and sticks his head out into the bright sunlight. The almost acid sharpness of the air displaces the stale fug of the tent. He breathes deeply, enjoying the cleansing burn of it in his lungs. A few dogs lift their heads in the direction of the sound. A number spring to their feet as his figure emerges onto the snow and crosses to the second tent. ‘Time to get up!’ Amundsen shakes one of the guy lines. The canvas offers a hollow reply in the stillness but without much delay there’s movement from within, and the ball of a head, pressed against the cloth. Johansen appears a few moments later.
‘Morning,’ he says, nodding at Amundsen. He wanders beyond the dogs, amid much barking, and relieves himself. There’s no shyness among them and certainly no privacy in such wide open spaces. More often than not the dogs will clean up any human mess left on the snow. Hungry dogs are anything but fussy.
‘Helmer!’ bellows Amundsen.
Helmer stirs from sleep. One eye open, he frowns at the daylight. None too delicately, Amundsen throws open the tent flaps and yanks his empty sleeping bag from next to Helmer and slings it onto the closest sledge. Helmer’s punishment will be getting dressed in a wash of cold air.
‘Breakfast,’ Amundsen says, setting up the Nansen cooker as the other man fumbles out of bed and into his outdoor clothing. It’s not a friendly suggestion. Prestrud and Johansen are already folding their bedding away. Helmer needs to pee but there’s clean snow to gather into the cooker, hot chocolate to make, the ration bag to unpack. The hiss of the Primus is another hint. He needs to sharpen up his act.
They’re on the road at 7.45 a.m. More than three hours to break camp and get the dogs organised. It’s too long. Helmer’s dawdling, that’s the only reason. Amundsen casts his eye around the area of trampled snow. Satisfied that they have not forgotten anything, he gives the signal. Once again Prestrud strides out on the Antarctic plain. Helmer turns and salutes like a soldier entering battle. Amundsen cannot stay mad at him – the truth is, with his humour, his knight-like fealty and their years of shared experience, Helmer’s worth a thousand men.