Sir Ranulph Fiennes - To The Ends Of The Earth: The Transglobe Expedition, The First Pole To Pole Circumnavigation Of The Globe

Sir Ranulph Fiennes was the first man to reach both poles by surface travel and the first to cross the Antarctic Continent unsupported. In the 1960s he was removed from the SAS Regiment for misuse of explosives but, after joining the army of the Sultan of Oman, received that countrys Bravery Medal on active service in 1971. He is the only person yet to have been awarded two clasps to the Polar medal for both Antarctic and the Arctic regions. Fiennes has led over thirty expeditions, including the first polar circumnavigation of the Earth, and in 2003 he ran seven marathons in seven days on seven continents in aid of the British Heart Foundation. In 1993 Her Majesty the Queen awarded Fiennes the Order of the British Empire (OBE) because, on the way to breaking records, he has raised over 14 million for charity. He was named Best Sportsman in the 2007 ITV Great Briton Awards and in 2009 he became the oldest Briton to reach the summit of Everest.

Also by Ranulph Fiennes

A Talent For Trouble

Ice Fall In Norway

The Headless Valley

Where Soldiers Fear To Tread

Hell On Ice

Bothie The Polar Dog (With Virginia Fiennes)

Living Dangerously

The Feather Men

Atlantis Of The Sands

Mind Over Matter

The Sett

Fit For Life

Beyond The Limits

The Secret Hunters

Captain Scott: The Biography

Mad, Bad And Dangerous To Know

Mad Dogs And Englishmen

Killer Elite

My Heroes

Cold

First published in Great Britain by Hodder and Stoughton Ltd, 1983
This paperback edition published by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd, 2014
A CBS COMPANY

Copyright by Ranulph Fiennes 1983

This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.
No reproduction without permission.
All rights reserved.

The right of Ranulph Fiennes to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-47113-570-5
ebook ISBN: 978-1-47113-571-2

Typeset in the UK by M Rules
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

For Poul Andersson

Whom we will not forget

I was lucky enough not only to be present at the start and at the finish of the Transglobe Expedition in London but also to be able to meet Ran Fiennes and his team when the Benjamin Bowring was moored in Sydney Harbour. For someone who participated in what I suspect were the only comfortable parts of the entire voyage to write a foreword may seem presumptuous. I am, however, delighted to be able to record my admiration for the extraordinary ingenuity, courage, imagination and sheer hard work of the entire expedition. I know that Ran himself would acknowledge that the party would never have left London, let alone returned there, without the work and support of the Committee at home and the incredibly generous help and sponsorship of so many different individuals and companies. This is, of course, true, but it is also true that notwithstanding the immensely important contributions made by everyone else, the ultimate success of Transglobe was due to the efforts of those who carried out this unprecedented adventure. How they endured the hardships that confronted them or survived the astonishing risks they took is beyond my comprehension. Their exploits have added another stirring chapter to the long history of polar explorers, whose heroic example has contributed greatly to mans knowledge as well as stimulating the imagination of countless people all over the world.

Great floods have flown from simple sources.

SHAKESPEARE

I n February 1972 my wife suggested we travel around the world.

I looked up from the boots I was polishing with a mixture of spit and black kiwi in readiness for a weekend with the Territorial SAS regiment.

Ginnie, we cant pay the mortgage. How the hell can we go round the world?

Get a contract from a newspaper, a book publisher and a TV company. She was peering into the simmering Irish stew. I knew it was Irish stew because that was, with very few exceptions, the only dish she had produced since our marriage eighteen months earlier.

They wont be interested, I replied. Everybody goes round the world.

They all do it horizontally.

I glanced at her, not sure I was understanding. She continued to poke at the stewpot without elaborating. Of course they do. There is no other way. I tried to keep my tone unsarcastic. Our life together was at the time a series of minor volcanic eruptions touched off by the tiniest sparks. You cant get over the top because of the Arctic Ocean and the Antarctic ice cap happens to cover the bottom.

She stopped prodding our supper and looked up. So? Her glacier-blue eyes were on me, unblinking.

So no sane person even tries to do it. If it were possible it would have been done. All oceans have been crossed west to east, north to south, solo, on rafts, backwards and sideways. All major mountains have been climbed and all rivers travelled up to their source and back down again. People have gone round the world by horse, bicycle and probably by broomstick. They have parachuted from over thirty thousand feet and gone paddling to the deepest spots in the deepest seas. Quite apart from messing around on the moon and planets.