Arctic Trucks

It was now midday, the weather was very nice, a little frost, the sun was shining and no wind at all. After we got back to Novo Viktor and Andrei suggested another camp visit. Close to Novo TAC operates a few guest houses occupied by NASA scientists. We drove on the „blue ice“ which was relatively easy to drive on, as long as you did not have to change course or brake a lot. After we got back to Novo we began installing various accessories that had been removed before the air transport. My flight had been delayed until 10 pm due to two explorers that had to give up their attempt to reach the South Pole and the plane was bringing them back to Novo. While we were working on the cars we got a lot of attention from the people there, including 6 guys from the Indian station Maitri which is a short drive away. When the cars were ready we decided to take a drive towards the mountains. On the way there are many sastrukies challenging the suspension. We took the air pressure down to 4 pounds and this softened the ride considerably. After dinner we went over the schedule for the next few days and looked at the maps of the plateau. It was getting time for me to fly back to Cape Town, I could already feel that I would miss not being there for the upcoming adventure. Because for Hjalti and Gísli the adventure is just getting started!

Emil Grímsson.

When we arrived in Novo we were greeted by Andrei, the ALCI station manager. He and Viktor that runs TAC were very excited to experience how our cars will cope in Antarctica. When the cars were out of the plane we put some body screws in the tires, since for some misunderstanding the ice screws for the tires had not been ordered, and took a test drive out to the White Desert Camp.  Andrei and Victor came with us and they were very impressed of how fast we could go and how comfortable the cars were. It was obvious that they were expecting us to get into trouble with driving down certain slopes on the way. But the cars did those slopes beautifully, even though you could feel it was very slippery and it was best not to make any major changes of course or speed. The Russians were impressed since we were considerably faster to drive this route on the cars than they usually were on snowmobiles. The White Desert Camps are really luxurious in comparison to other camps in this area.

Opposite the camp is a steep blue ice mountain that the Russians challenged us to test.  With only normal body screws instead of special ice screws,  and still missing screws altogether we had our concerns. This was a 200 meters high mountain with some steep slopes and some cracks we needed to avoid. But the pressure was on an we decided to go for it and managed to go up to the top even with making some changes of the course. We were a little bit worried regarding driving down those slopes but that did also go well.  Everybody was very impressed and we were told that those slopes were much steeper than those we will be facing on the plateau, so we would have nothing to worry about!  The cars were really getting the attention they deserved!

Andrei and Viktor drove the cars back to Novo and they drove fast. They were very impressed and wanted to take more test drives, visit more stations. They said that it suddenly looked like the distances had become much shorter!  When we came back a lot of the people situated in Novo came to look at the cars, obviously the story was out that those cars were great!

Emil Grímsson.

We landed at Novo airbase around 2 o‘clock in the night, the weather was bright, a little wind and the temperature was around -8 Celsius. During the landing we could watch the approach and touchdown on a screen inside the plane, the Russian pilot did a marvelous job!

The unloading of the cars was successful, but there were some scratches on the cars from the luggage that had been piled all around them. Obviously people were not too concerned about scratches and dents!

The airport in Novo is the only airport in this part of Antarctica that is open to public. Close to Troll, the Norwegian station is another big airport which is mainly used by state agencies and for emergency.  ALCI (Antarctica Logistics Company International) is located next to Novo airport, but that is a South African company, owned by Russian business men, which takes care of transportation of people and cargo from South Africa to this part Antarctica, where most of the research stations are located. Not too far away is White Desert Camp, a former Russian station where wealthy tourists can stay, the Indian research station is also close by. Also close by is TAC (The Antarctica Company) which is a small private camp.

Emil Grimsson.

We landed in Novo at 3:40, we are on Greenwich meantime here, same time as in Iceland. We took some test driving and found out that there is a lot of blue ice here. Since we did not have special ice screws to put in the tires, we used original body screws and they worked all right. Victor, Andrei and the head technician showed us the way down to White Desert which is a tourist camp close by. We are located by the airport, 500 meters above sea level. White desert is 400 meters below, close to Novo Island and Oasis. We stay in a heated tent which is very comfortable.
We tried taking the cars up the steepest ice slope around, that used to be part of a route.  The car managed this very well and could drive 45-55 km. Pr hour. It was very slippery though and the body screws we had put in the tires made all the difference.
We went back to the airport and had some more coffee. Then we drove down to Oasis and drove on some wide gravel road they use to drive the tanks on. This is probably the first time a car drives on those roads!
We always get supper at 19:00 in the food tent. We have a Russian cook that makes all kinds of soups and other kinds of food.
From here to Oasis are 15 kilometers. We can drive on 50-80 kilometers per hour so it takes us close to 15 minutes to drive.  Until now old tanks from the soviet era have been used for transportation and the trip has taken 45-60 minutes. Travelling with us is therefore a great luxury for the people here.

Gísli Jónsson