The Endurance_ Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition - Caroline Alexander [64]
At the top of the saddle, in the early dawn light, the mist thinned sufficiently to open a partial view down upon what appeared to be a frozen lake. Taking a short break to eat a biscuit, they struck out for it, as Shackleton believed that this course would be easier than keeping to the high ground. After an hour of walking, they began to notice signs of crevasses, and realized they were walking on a snow-covered glacier. They continued cautiously until the mist below cleared enough to reveal that the water was neither a lake, nor frozen, as a trick of the light had led them to believe. It was in fact Possession Bay, an arm of the sea on the eastern coast, roughly opposite their own King Haakon Bay on the west. Knowing that the coast was impassable, they had no choice but to turn back and retrace their steps. It was a foolish error, for Possession Bay was marked clearly on their map, but it gives some idea of the utter lack of context in which they had begun the march.
The sun rose in a calm, cloudless sky, promising continued, rare good weather; haste had to be made while circumstances permitted. In daylight, however, the snow surface became softer than ever, and at times they sank up to their knees, slogging along in a manner that must have evoked for Shackleton and Crean their man-hauling sledging marches of so long ago. At 9 a.m.they paused for their first meal. The hoosh pot was filled with snow, and Crean lit the Primus. When the snow was melted, two bricks of sledging rations were added, and the hoosh eaten as hot and as quickly as they took lying flat on their backs, spread-eagled in the snow. Since departing Patience Camp on April 9, six weeks before, the men had had little opportunity even to stretch their legs; twenty-four days of those six weeks had been spent cramped in the rocking boats. Their frostbitten feet had not yet regained all feeling, and their clothes, saturated with salt water, now rubbed their chafed inner thighs raw. Now, climbing knee deep in snow, they were quickly exhausted.
Two hours after their meal, they reached a range of five rocky crags that stood, like the stubby fingers of an upheld hand, across their path. The gaps between the crags appeared to offer four distinct passes to the land behind. Aiming for the closest and southernmost of these, Shackleton led the way, cutting steps up the slope with the adze as they drew nearer to the crest.
“The outlook was disappointing,” Shackleton reported from the top. “I looked down a sheer precipice to a chaos of crumpled ice 1500 ft. below. There was no way down for us.” A mountain crag prevented them from crossing over to the next pass, and so they could do nothing but retrace their steps down the long slope that had taken them three hours to climb.
Eager to make up lost ground, they began the tramp up to the second gap without ado, halting only for a hasty meal. But on reaching the “pass” they were again disappointed.
“We stood between two gigantic black crags that seemed to have forced their way upwards through their icy covering,” wrote Worsley. “Before us was the Allardyce range, peak beyond peak, snow-clad and majestic, glittering in the sunshine. Sweeping down from their flanks were magnificent glaciers, noble to look upon, but, as we realized, threatening to our advance.”
Wearily, numbly, they made yet another retreat down