Arctic Trucks

I have not reported properly for some days now, so I am going to give you some highlights of what we have been doing the last few days. Tony and I waited at the South Pole for some days and we were very happy when Emil and Victor arrived there with the last airplane. Emil brought the necessary spare parts to repair the cars. Victor went on with the plane to the fuel drop where he met Gísli and Kenny to help them clean up the area and make sure that it was tidy after the planes were gone.
Emil and I started repairing the gearbox in Ingrid (my car!). When that was finished we loaded the cars and prepared departure from the South Pole. Of course we took all the trash and made sure that our stay there did not leave any trace. One of the things we needed to take with us was a barrel full of shit (!) that we had to lift up on the trailer.  One of the employees at the station here at the South Pole was nice enough to give us a few beers which made this job a lot easier!
We left the South Pole on January 30th and when we had driven for 100 kilometers the transfer box broke! Emil had brought a new one so we just took out the old and put the new one in. I am getting pretty good at changing the transfer boxes and gearboxes in 40 degrees minus and I have impressed some of the people, even though my fingers are not that impressed! But at that time I was getting pretty tired and I forgot to fasten one of the bolts. Because of this, all the oil leaded out of the box and it broke again! Then we just put up a camp and turned one of the tents into a garage! We took the transfer box out and rebuilt it entirely by using spare parts as well as parts from the old transfer box. Pretty impressive in 40 degrees minus! Emil made a very strong move when he bewitched some bacon out of the box holding the spare parts! Tony fried the bacon and gave us some real meat which was a most welcomed relief from eating dried food from a plastic bag, or envelope-food as we call it! We then slept for four hours before continuing.

We drove on towards the fuel drop in a very good weather. When we had close to 160 kilometers to go we drove into a fog. When the sun shines above the fog and sends its beams into it, everything gets blurry. This is called a Whiteout. In this situation the visibility is next to nothing and we had some trouble keeping the cars in the tracks. And at this point the front shock absorbers in Ingrid broke, first one and we welded that one together, but an hour later the other one broke too!

I think Emil is starting to realize that he has not come here to rest! He is already as tired as the rest of us. He is starting to adjust to the height, but he starts his journey in 2850 meters. The air pressure is lower here than usually and therefore the effect of the height is more severe.

At 2 o‘clock last night we finally reached the fuel drop. We put up camps and slept for few hours. This morning we had to change a bearing in the trailer before we loaded it with fuel for the rest of the journey and at 13:30 we drove off towards Novo. We have been able to keep a good speed, the weather is nice, no wind and the temperature is 27 degrees below.  We are driving in the tracks we made on the way to the Pole.  Gísli and Kenny are 100 kilometers ahead of us. They left the fuel drop yesterday morning after cleaning up the area around the fuel drop which now looks very neat and all trash has been taken away. Hopefully we will meet them tonight and to celebrate we will have a steak that Emil brought with him. We will fry the steak on the primus and all kind of dried food, envelope food, will be forbidden tonight!

We still have close to 1.400 kilometers to go before we reach Novo where our journey ends.

Hjalti V. Hjaltason

After a good rest we had a very good day and drove close to 500 kilometers. We now have 35 km to go before we get to the fuel drop. Gísli and his team are close to 100 kilometres ahead of us. We planned to reach them today but it is clear that we will not be able to do that because the visibility is very bad. We are driving in white-out, a white haze is all over and it is very difficult to keep the cars in the tracks.

Emil Grímsson

Sunday February 1st, at 20:00

We (Hjalti, Tony, Sara and Emil) are doing fine now after some problems shortly after leaving the Pole. The front axle broke on one of the cars and it took about 8-10 hours to fix it.  There is also a bit of delay because we are responsible for picking up items left behind by the competitors and support teams on their trip to the Pole.
We have been driving almost non-stop since then, speed between 20 - 45 km/t., and are now about half-way between the Pole and the fuel drop, and plan to camp within a few hours to get some rest.

Emil Grímsson

Saturday January 31st, 2009 at 19:00

The airplane from Novo arrived to the Southpole early in the morning.  After the airplane left again later in the day with all the competitors,  Hjalti, Sara, Tony and Emil prepared and loaded  the cars for  the journey back to Novo. Everybody is in good condition and looking forward to the trip. They expect to meet the other group (Gisli, Kenny, Deadre and Victor) within 2-3 days at the fuel drop. The sky is clear with temperatures from -29˚ celsious with the wind factor down to -40˚.

January 29th, 2009,

Emil

Hjalti and Tony are still waiting at the Pole for the parts to arrive. It will arrive with the last plane that will transfer the competitors to Novo. Hjalti has already done all possible preparation work. They are planning to fix the cars quickly and turn back to Novo as quickly as they can.

The temperature at the Pole is now close to 40 degrees below with some wind. It gets colder quickly those days because winter is coming. The last two weeks the temperature has dropped by 10 degrees.  Hjalti and Tony are comfortable and have been able to rest for the last few days. But they are eager to get going again!

Gísli and Kenny are still at the fuel drop. They have been able to dig up 67 barrels of oil at that were buried into the snow when the Russians dropped them from the airplane. They are comfortable while waiting for the last plane to arrive on the way to the Pole. 

People have been able to rest a little the last few days, after some tough weeks.

Emil left Cape Town at 8 o´clock this morning, heading for Novo. He had some busy days in Cape Town arranging spare parts to bring with him. It is mostly axles and wheel bearings that have been breaking down, due to much too heavy load on the cars on the way to the Pole. It created problems because they had to leave some of the spare parts behind to make the cars lighter plus it was bad for the cars. If everything goes as planned Emil will be at the Pole in 2 or 3 days, but he will get there with the last plane. He and Victor from the Novo station will drive back with the others.

We did some repair work on Kenny’s car yesterday, but Kenny left on Tony's car since that car was in a very good shape. We are waiting for some spare parts that will arrive with the plane that will pick up the competitors. Tony’s car not working at the moment but that will change as soon as we get the spare parts. My car is working fine. Yesterday I took the doctor to see one of the competitors that had hurt his finger about 150 kilometers from the Pole. He was not badly hurt. We just went on one car and were able to drive at 60 kilometers pr. hour.  Tony and I will wait patiently on the South Pole for the airplane. Gísli and Kenny left the South Pole on January 22nd. They headed for the Fuel drop 900 kilometers from here and I think they made it there late yesterday. They have been working on getting the barrels ready. The distances are so great here that the plane has to land for fuel on the way from Novo to the Pole. Gísli and Kenny have been travelling lightly and have been able to follow the track. As far as we know there has not been any trouble with their cars.

Best regards,
Hjalti

P.S. When we managed to get in touch with Hjalti he was just back from using the „bumper dumper“ – a very popular accessory for those cars. The temperature here is close to 30 degrees below! Click here to look at pictures of the bumper dumper.