XC skiing books for
Christmas - 3 (Nansen)
Date first posted on eCommunity - 5
November 2007
THE FIRST CROSSING OF GREENLAND
Fridtjof Nansen
Birlinn, Edinburgh. 2002
ISBN 1-84158-216-6
This is an abridged version of Nansen's classic "Pa Ski Over
Groenland", which was originally published in Norwegian in 1890 and
was then soon translated into several other languages. It tells the
story of how in 1888 the explorer, with a team of five, made the
first complete traverse of Greenland.
The team's project was an audacious one. They would
start from the
uninhabited east coast and make for the inhabited west. Nansen's
typically uncompromising rationale for doing the journey in that
direction was that it would remove the temptation to turn back if
they encountered problems. There would be no choice but to go
forward.
Of central importance to Nansen was that the party should travel on
skis, and in selecting his men he insisted that they were
experienced skiers. Chapter two of the book is devoted to a history
and description of skiing, "since so little is known about the sport
outside the few countries where it is practised as such". It is a
factual account, with information about ski construction and skiing
technique. But it also contains some very enthusiastic promotion of
the sport, as both a recreational and a competitive activity. For
example:
"I know no form of sport which so evenly develops the muscles, which
renders the body so strong and elastic, which teaches so well the
qualities of dexterity and resource, which in an equal degree calls
for decision and resolution, and which gives the same vigour and
exhilaration to mind and body alike."
The eventual success of the expedition not only brought Nansen
enormous publicity and honour but also contributed to a massive
upsurge of interest in skiing throughout Europe and North America.
However, before the team members could show the effectiveness of
their skis, they first had to make it to the east coast of
Greenland, and this in itself was a major adventure that takes up
almost half of the book. Setting out from Oslo at the beginning of
May, they took one steamer from Oslo to Leith, then another via the
Faroes to Iceland. Here they joined a sealing ship that would "do
its best to put us ashore on the east coast of Greenland". In the
event it was 17 July before they disembarked from the sealer and set
off in their small boats. They had just ten miles of ice-floe to
negotiate before landfall. But they were soon caught up in a strong
current that carried them southwards and away from land, and it took
them twelve days of very hazardous drifting before they did reach
land, very much further south than they had intended. They had to
fight back northwards in their boats, keeping very close to the
coast, and it was mid-August before they reached a point at which
they could begin their traverse of the Inland Ice.
The traverse itself was hardly a pleasant journey. First came the
ascent on to the Inland ice, negotiating treacherous snow-covered
crevasses: "As a matter of fact, we fell through rarely, and then
only to our armpits". During this period it poured continuously with
rain. More bad weather befell them as they gained height, and at
one point they were unable to leave camp for three days. Finally
they reached more gently sloping ground, and calmer weather, and
climbed to an eventual height of just under 8,000 feet. "All this
time", wrote Nansen, "our life was simply inordinately monotonous,
with not a trace of any important occurrence." By now it was early
September and the lateness of the season brought fresh snow, which
impeded their progress and drifted at night through the many
openings of their tent. And it grew very cold: one night their
thermometer recorded -40 degrees Centigrade.
With much effort and much danger they finally made it, on 26
September, after about six weeks on the Inland ice, to the shores of
the west coast. It took more adventure, including the construction
of a makeshift boat from their sledges and tarpaulins, before they
reached the safety of the Danish settlement at Godthaab. Here they
found they had missed the last steamer of the year, and would need
to spend the winter at the settlement.
When Nansen and the team finally made it back to Norway on 30 May in
the following year they were welcomed as heroes. A flotilla of
sailing boats met them in Christiania (Oslo) Fjord, a crowd of
60,000 was waiting by the pier, and 50,000 followed them through the
streets to their hotel.
This account of their adventure is a nicely solid volume of about
300 pages, enlivened by some original photographs and drawings. It's
a good book to curl up with on a dark winter's evening.
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