No comments about Antarctica Travel Images / Fotos de viaje.

No comments about South to the Pole by Ski/Nine Men and Two Women Pioneer a New Route to the South Pole.

5 comments about Searchers.

1. Very quick review, this is a well written book. Full of detail with an in depth story line. I am looking forward to more books by this same author. I forsee his work becoming common place in my library. Well done.



2. This book is terrific vacation or leisure reading. I enjoyed the page-turning action and suspense, as well as the vivid and accurate descriptions of Antarctica, especially the storms. "Searchers" is a unique blend of sci-fi, adventure/action, with just the right touch of romance. This author could well be the next Michael Crichton...



3. Having been the owner of a fast growing small business for the past 14 years and involved in many community and professional activities (in addition to family responsibilities), I have not taken the time to read an entire book for years, and I have not read a novel since before I started my business. I've bought recommended books from time-to-time, read the first few chapters, but have never finished reading any of the books.

   Recently, a good friend recommended Scott Browning's book, Searchers, and I actually read it from cover to cover! I fould Searchers to be extremely enjoyable reading. The tale is filled with intrigue, excitement, adventure, risk, surprise and human emotion. I've always enjoyed science fiction, particularly when it is founded on theories that could someday prove to be reality.

   I think Scott Browning's Searchers would appeal to most busy entrepreneurs who have an inherent drive to pursue the adventure of the unknowm and take risks. I recommend Searchers highly to other entrepreneurs as an outstanding diversion from the routing reading of business books and articles.

   Chuck McCabe
   President & CEO
   Peoples Income Tax, Inc.




4. This book is a compelling adventure story set in the world's most unforgiving continent,
   Antarctica. The characters are well-drawn, the plot clips along nicely, and the author's
   descriptions of the vast, frozen hinterland are at times poetic. As I read, I couldn't help
   but envision this tale being spun on film. Browning's movie industry experience has given this
   story the edge it needs to become a box-office hit. I recommend this book for adults
   only due to violence, moderate sexual content, and colorful language. For busy people without much
   time for leisure reading, Scott Browning provides a fast-paced, fascinating diversion that can easily
   be read in a few evenings, provided ofcourse that the reader can put the book down!



5. Intriguing from beginning to end, this first effort by Mr. Browning will be a light in the wilderness for more to come.

No comments about You Have to Be Lucky: Antarctic and Other Adventures.

No comments about The Antarctic Journals of Reginald Skelton: Another Little Job for the Tinker.

3 comments about SHADOWS ON THE WASTELAND: CROSSING ANTARCTICA WITH RANULPH FIENNES.

1. A fascinating epic with all the hardships and truths told. An honest account of human mental and physical strengths and weaknessness. At times it unecessarily draws you into the on going ego battle between Stroud and Fiennes.



2. Adverturers come in all shapes and sizes - of ego, that is! And this book is an excellent opportunity to see the diversity of people who succeed at extremely challenging outdoor pursuits. I thoroughly enjoyed this account from a relatively modest style of person, who took on and succeeded at a challenge, the difficulty of which left me aching and bleary eyed just thinking about it.

   In an era where many traditional sports have taken on some kind of "extreme" variant, this book defines "extreme" in a way that makes other pursuits pale by comparison. I was gripped that it provided an interesting insight into what life is like when you take on the genuinely extreme challenge.

   People that merely, say, base jump from a helicopter onto the top of a snow-covered mountain in order to snowboard from apex to base, are amateurs compared to these chaps. They - voluntarily! - walked across the Antarctic continent via the South Pole just because they thought they could. Of course, they did raise a legendary amount of money to benefit research into multiple sclerosis, but that is not central to the story told in this book.

   Mike Stroud gives one side of the story, in a manner that reveals his concerns over his own fallibility, whilst at the same time providing a case study in how an apparently ordinary bloke does an extraordinary thing. He is clearly not the ego-on-two-legs-type that many imagine these guys would be - but the writing reeks of someone committed to his views and those views involving a huge amount of thought. So, despite a self-effacing style, he seems unlikely to lack belief in himself - despite acute and moving accounts of his struggles to retain focus on a harrowing and debilitating slog across the most incredibly inhospitable tract of terrain. I liked the fact that he did things well beyond ordinary, despite not being ten-foot-tall-and-bulletproof the way we imagine many of these guys to be!

   The other side of the story is told by his trek partner, Ranulph Fiennes (Sir, actually, with a bunch of that English stuff about being a Baronet and all), in his book "Mind over Matter". In many respects of style and personality, he is most things that Mike Stroud is not, so anyone with a picture of the larger-than-life-ego-on-two-legs kind of adventurer might well here some bells ringing when they read this account.

   The contradictions between the two accounts are not black and white, but, in the shades of grey, there was enough interest at the time of their publication to put them both into that elite class of public figures - where they were the subject of a newspaper cartoonist's pen. Another thing that I like about Stroud's account is that he highlighted this, rather than papering over it.

   Frankly, I liked Fiennes' account of the trip as well, but it was more predictable in a curious sort of way. Possibly the most can be gained from Mike Stroud's book when Fiennes' acount is read also - classic stuff where neither is completely right or wrong, and that is probably less important in any case than gaining a picture of how you are seen by others, or how divergent your image of yourself can be from that harboured by close colleagues.

   This book - and Fiennes' - may well give you an appetite for more along the same lines, if you don't have one already! Try reading "The Worst Journey in the World" by Apsley Cherry-Garrard, or "Home of the Blizzard" by Douglas Mawson.




3. Englishmen Ranulph Fiennes and Mike Stroud together made four failed attempts on the North Pole. Their major success was an expedition both inwardly expected to fail - the unsupported (carry everything) crossing of Antarctica.
   
   There had already been an unsupported trip to the South Pole. Indeed, as they were making their crossing, the Scandinavian explorer Erling Kagge - who claimed the first unsupported trip to the North Pole, disputed by his rivals Stroud and Fiennes - was making the first solo unsupported trip to the South Pole.
   
   The crossing of the Antarctic continent, however impractical, was the next logical goal. This account, and another by Fiennes entitled "Mind Over Matter," stress the grinding wear and tear on the human body, the bleak, black thoughts that accompany every labored step, and the life-threatening hazards of weather, crevassed terrain and starvation.
   
   The difference in their stories is entirely point-of-view and personality.
   
   Fiennes, the leader, sounds a practical, matter-of-fact note - his appendices on leadership, equipment, history and topography are nearly as long as his personal account. Stroud, the younger and smaller man, is more volatile and impassioned, resentful of the very notion of leadership in a two-man expedition.
   
   They began the trip unsure that they would even be able to budge their sledges - loaded with 485 pounds of food, fuel and equipment. "It would be so embarrassing if, once in our harnesses, our efforts came to nought and the sledges refused to budge," says Stroud.
   
   After four hours they had moved only a couple of miles on their 1,700 hundred mile journey. And the next day they had their first equipment failure - a thermos that left one of the major respites of their day, hot soup, cold and full of gelatinous fat globs.
   
   On they went. Sails, parachutes inflated by the wind, had been an early bone of contention between them. Stroud was insistent, Fiennes, dubious about their usefulness and the added weight, agreed reluctantly. On their first try both found them terrifying and exhilarating.
   
   Says Stroud, "Compared with the toil of manhauling, to be pulled forward at high speed was a delight so intense that to ignore it, merely because it was difficult and dangerous, was near impossible."
   
   And Fiennes, "After a hectic ten minutes of being dragged over ice ridges, crossing ski tips and being struck in the back by the sledge....I suddenly spotted a blueish shadow some forty feet ahead."
   
   Fiennes threw himself to one side. Stroud, used to seeing his companion fall, started to go around. Going too fast to stop, he plunged into the crevasse. Says Fiennes, "Appalling thoughts crowded my mind: chiefly how I would explain Mike's death to his wife and mother."
   
   But Stroud had landed on a precarious snow bridge. The description of extricating him and his sledge is harrowing. The sledge was permanently but not crucially damaged. On they went.
   
   Black thoughts, with no other outlet, turned on one another. Their chief friction was pacing. Stroud believed Fiennes was going slower than necessary because of brooding over his age (47); Fiennes believed Stroud was wasting energy by going too fast and later attributed hypothermic episodes to this depletion. Both experienced intense anger toward the other, most of which they avoided expressing except in their diaries.
   
   Consuming 5,200 calories a day, they were using 6,000 to 8,000, even 10,000. Slow starvation far outpaced the lessening of weight on the sledges. Because of Stroud's medical record keeping, (ironically described in greater daily detail by Fiennes) chemical changes and physical debilitation were documented with appalling exactitude.
   
   Both were subject to digestion problems, chronic frostbite infections, sores from chafing clothing and harnesses, skin damage from the depleted ozone layer, blindness from white-outs and from the absence of anything to focus on. But starvation was chief among their troubles, leading to muscle loss (even of the heart muscle) as well as every bit of insulating fat.
   
   When Fiennes finally called a halt after Stroud experienced several life-threatening bouts of hypothermia and hypoglycemia they had crossed the continent, although not the ice shelf which intervened between continent and ocean. They had succeeded, raising millions (at a penny per mile) for the Multiple Sclerosis Society, accomplishing major physiological research and being first to cross the continent unsupported. This, despite all the practical, idealistic reasons given, was their reason for going, a reason incomprehensible to most of us.
   
   Both books are well-written, expressive of separate personalities undergoing the same grueling physical and mental hardships. Both acknowledge they could not have made it without the other, for mental reasons as well as physical. Both are riveting accounts of exploration in a place few of us ever wish to go.

No comments about Tectonics of the Scotia Arc, Antarctica.

No comments about Unsung Hero.

5 comments about Below the Convergence: Voyages Toward Antarctica 1699-1839.

1. In an age where the entire planet hads been mapped from space it's hard to realize that there was a time, not that long ago, when the existence of a Southern continent was still a matter of speculation and doubt. Gurney's book beins with voyages of the Dutch East India company, skirting the South polar regions around the beginning of the 17th century and ends with the complete maping of the coast of Antarctica in the mid-19th. Along the way are detailed stories not only of the early polar explorers, but scores of detailed asides on such diverse topics as the food and other provisions used by sailors, the problem of scurvy, the history of the rum ration, and the story of John Harrsion and his clocks that made detailed navigation and mapping possible. An excellent choice for fans of sailing, history, discovery or geography.



2. Every fan of Antarctic exploration should read this book. It is a great tribute to those who came so many years before Shackleton, Scott and others into this completely unknown part of our world. The accounts are vivid and often times humorous, in spite of the incredible hardships these men endured. Although this might be considered difficult subject matter, the author does a great job of telling each story of adventure in a compelling and griping manner. We owe much to these men for their leadership, courage and vision. The account of Captain Cook is particularly good. What a great leader! This is a good addition for all you arm-chair explorers.



3. After decades of reading daily, this is the first book I have ever read that when I finished, I immediately turned to the first page and started my second reading. For anyone interested in Antartica, this book is a must, and it is very well written. It's about courage, determination, the environment and maybe most of all about geometry.



4. For whatever reason, recent book reviewers try to relate any nautical book to Patrick O'Brien's fiction. This is akin to relating the taste of any strange mystery meat to the taste of chicken. There is absolutely no relationship between the present book and O'Brien's fiction. One can wonder if some reviewers actually read the books they review. Having said that -

   The book provides an interesting overview of early Antarctic exploration, both planned and accidental. There is a chapter on scurvy, the bane of historic long sea voyages, with indications of the various means used for prevention - as usual, politics got in the way of common sense (the British government used lime juice controlled by British interests instead of the more effective lemon juice controlled by Spanish interests) and the government was slow to adopt what was being routinely used in the private sector. There is also a chapter on the problems in finding longitude, and an overview chapter on the Southern Ocean and the Antarctic Convergence.

   Accounts of the voyages begin with Edmund Halley's expedition aboard the Paramore in the closing years of the 17th century, then skip forward to the second voyage of James Cook (1772-1775). Sealers began their activities immediately after the American Revolution. One problem with scientific exploration, then as now, was that commercial interests immediately rushed in to exploit any resources discovered, initially decimating the fur seal population. John Nicol in his autobiography (see John Nicol, Mariner) mentions being aboard the Amelia (1791-1792) when they killed and skinned 30,000 seals at the Island of Lopex (Lobos Island in northern Peru). The sealers added some knowledge, but mainly to identify sealing grounds. There are some comments about diet - people commonly ate penguins among other things.

   People carrying out research are familiar with dealing with bureaucracies that want proposals two or three years in advance with an indication of what discoveries will be made before the research is conducted. Consequently, real discoveries are often unfunded, i.e., it is work carried out on the side while carrying out other funded work. William Smith commanded the merchant ship Williams on a voyage from Buenos Aires to Valparaiso when he discovered the South Shetland Islands, somewhat by accident, early in 1819 while sailing westward around Cape Horn. On a subsequent voyage around the Horn that same year, he made an unauthorized deviation in his route to go south for further exploration (insurance companies tended to forbid such deviations). After he reported his discoveries, the Royal Navy chartered the Williams later that same year and, under the command of Edward Bransfield, made the first observations of the mountain ranges on the Antarctic Peninsula and sailed a short distance into the Weddell Sea (the British lost Bransfield's journal). The immediate rush of sealers into the area resulted in the slaughtering of an estimated half million seals during the 1820-1821 season. Forty sealing ships visited the islands during the 1821-1822 season and essentially exterminated the remaining seals. William Smith eventually died in poverty in an almshouse.

   The book goes on to discuss the voyages of James Clark Ross, James Weddell, and others up through 1839, with some mention of later expeditions. It provides a good description of the early Antarctic explorers and their voyages through the ice and freezing temperatures.




5. Beginning with Ptolemey and all the way up to the first siting of the Ant- arctic Continent, Gurney does a yeoman's job of presenting the finds and ever expanding knowledge of the Southern Ocean. As a sailor and scientist, Gurney presents both the good and bad when discussing the voyages of discovery of such men as Captains Cook and Bellinghausen; versus the luck and scandals of the sealers and whalers.
   
   Each discovery builds on the previous findings and Gurney explains not only what the political consequences were but also the economic impacts. The sad part of this documentation is the annihilation of first the fur seals and then the other seals for the hides and oil, and then onto the whales. The destruction was so complete, that it is only now, one hundred years after the ending of the trade that the populations are back up to their pre-1800 numbers.
   
   What I found most gratifying was Gurney's narrative as to what happened to the 'discoverers' later in life. Most died young, some from disease and quite a number of others (including Cook) where killed by natives of the islands they discovered. It's only fitting in a way, since their discoveries contributed to the destruction of so many of the native culture (such as Tahiti and Tierra del Fuego).

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