Sleep does not come easily. Altitude is undoubtedly playing havoc with the body’s natural rhythms – breathing, digestion. And all the red meat consumed over the last few days is sitting like lead in the gut; Amundsen knows its effect on his haemorrhoids will be pure agony.
This snail’s pace is infuriating for the chief. The pole may be within reach but conditions are beyond certain. He hates the fact that the ground is falling away. At 3000 metres they should have done with all of that. They should be on the flat. Already at 86 degrees south and not through the mountains? Amundsen forces himself to concentrate on the four degrees of latitude that remain. Perhaps a week lies between them and Shackleton’s world record of 88 degrees, 23 minutes, assuming they maintain their pace. To pass that point would deliver a boost to morale. But the infernal delays imposed by heavy weather, fog, wind drift, a treacherous surface and sticky snow offer the scenario Amundsen most fears – that they will only arrive after Scott.
‘Stop your bloody snoring!’ Amundsen shouts.
The bodies rearrange themselves. The snoring ceases. It’s 3 a.m. Suddenly aware of how much brighter it appears outside through the tent fabric, Amundsen wriggles free of his sleeping bag and slouches over to the flap. He delivers a swift kick to Sverre’s sleeping form as the wheezing starts up again, but then realises it’s Bjaaland who’s responsible for the hideous sounds. He kicks him too.
The dogs look up as Amundsen appears. The chief takes in his surroundings for the first time. In a rare show of generosity, the sun has offered a glimpse of the landscape. Amundsen is dressed lightly. He folds his arms tightly across his chest for warmth and walks a short distance to see what lies beyond the tent. A couple of animals let out an expectant yap. Satisfied that no immediate peril awaits them on their chosen path, he returns to bed. Small careful steps will see them through, day after day after day in this wilderness of white summits and ridges and hillsides and plains. They just need to keep at it. Soon enough they’ll reach the Antarctic Plateau proper. They have to.
They break camp by 8 a.m. to face yet another day of obstacles. The route plunges down then up again. It feels like they’re conquering a mighty sea one huge frozen wave at a time. The dogs lurch, stagger and scrape their way to the top of each hard-packed drift then stumble down the other side, sinking to their shoulders in the loose snow that has pooled in the hollows between the massive swells. Poor desperate creatures, thinks Amundsen; perhaps they should lighten the loads? A depot of ice-hard snow is hastily erected and a black provision crate placed on top.
Setting off again, the men are thankful for a brief window of sunlight. The panorama would inspire poets. A mountain rises at least 4500 metres into the air and appears topped with a crown of colossal ice crystals. The giant presides over a sea of enormous glaciers which tumble downwards in horrible disarray. The largest of them stretches right across their path as far as the eye can see. Gnarled and violently misshapen, it’s like a dragon’s tail on an unimaginable scale.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ says Amundsen, half in awe, half in dread. ‘It looks like someone’s lifted the continent above their head and smashed it down in anger.’
‘It’s old,’ says Helmer. ‘Look how it’s all filled in with snow. There’ll be a way through. Sure to be.’
Binoculars reveal a possible approach. Heads together, the men discuss the best way to tackle the task. And then, seemingly on cue, the weather closes in. The monster retreats into the gloom. As if the challenge wasn’t great enough already, now they will have to pick out the route from memory.
‘Perhaps it’s for the best,’ Amundsen says, trying to be philosophical in the face of dreadful luck. ‘Staring at the immensity of this glacier would put any man off attempting to cross it.’
Sverre and Amundsen rope up and gingerly establish a path between crevasses. Helmer, Bjaaland and Oscar accompany the three dog teams in careful convoy, all too aware that any misstep could be fatal. The dogs proceed with an almost human sense of caution. Last to cross, Oscar feels a sickening thud as the snow bridge collapses under him. The dogs bark. He snatches at his sledge, hauling himself clear of the void. The dogs skitter forward, alarmed by the abrupt jerk and even more by Oscar’s panicked cry. Safety by a hair’s-breadth. Oscar can’t help but look down. The depth of the blue hole makes his guts surge. Instinctively he reaches for the nearest dog and buries his face and both hands into its fur.
‘You alright, Oscar?’ Helmer calls back.
It takes him a moment to answer. ‘Yes,’ he says finally.
Meanwhile Sverre and Amundsen have their own challenges.
‘How can we go any further? It’s pure chaos,’ Sverre says with a doleful look on his face.
Amundsen can see for himself the impossibility of their surroundings. ‘The Devil’s Glacier’, they’ve started calling it. The only rational course is to hold their position.
Amundsen calls to Helmer. ‘We’re going set up camp. But I need you to come on a scouting mission. Let’s find a way through this labyrinth.’
Helmer is weary. He’d prefer to retire to his sleeping bag. But refusing the chief is unthinkable. ‘Come on, Helmer,’ says Amundsen. ‘It’s like finding a way through the Northwest Passage all over again.’
‘Yeah, nothing to it,’ Helmer replies with a sneer. ‘Only took us three years.’
With growing frustration, the two men soon realise they must endure 2 kilometres of ducking and weaving between gaps and crevasses to travel a fraction of that distance in the right direction. The wind has whisked away more snow, revealing ancient blue glacial ice. Skis offer limited function on such a slippery surface. And where are the crampons? As fate would have it, abandoned with all the equipment deemed surplus to requirements back at the Butcher’s Shop depot. This could spell the end of their journey. The race lost over such a trifle. Amundsen clenches his jaw so hard he thinks it might shatter.
Helmer will not give up. He manages to pick a path, making headway even if it can only be measured in metres, tacking east then west over snow bridges that look set to disintegrate under his weight. Up an incline, slowly down a slope, between pressure ridges thrust up like municipal buildings until it seems they can tend southward again.
‘Take a look at that!’ he shouts.
A long wall of ice, rising 6 metres or more into the air, blocks their route. Clearly it has been standing guard for some time, judging by the large opening that the wind has carved at its heart.
‘If this is the Devil’s Glacier then that must be Hell’s Gate,’ says Amundsen.
The two men establish a pathway and, with a bit of careful sidestepping, manage to look through the hole. They both agree that the going appears better on the other side.
‘See? What did I tell you?’ says Helmer. ‘Nothing to it.’