Shackleton Traverse 22’. King Haakon Bay
After two days cowering from the wind in Undine Harbour, it was exhilarating to head back out to sea, hoist the mainsail and beat south to King Haakon Bay. Petrels and cormorants circled in the sky. A cold south-westerly whipped spume off the wave crests. Off to our left huge breakers crashed against the cliffs.
This south coast of the island is a wild place and you can’t help thinking of Shackleton, Worsley and the other four men arriving here in 1916, after fourteen days at sea in a 6 metres lifeboat. Against all the odds they had made it!
Alas it wasn’t that simple. By a cruel stroke of fate a huge storm broke that night. Suddenly that wild, uncharted lee shore was the last place they wanted to be. All night long they tacked back and forth, fighting to get away from land.
Hungry, cold, exhausted and racked by thirst, they were fighting for their lives, bailing continuously, fighting to control their basic reefed sailing rig. Then the mast collapsed. Then they came within a whisker of being shipwrecked on the offshore Anenkov Island.
Having survived against all the odds over the last year, they really thought that their last hour had come. But at dawn the boat was still afloat and as the weather relented they tacked back west. That evening they slipped into King Haakon Bay.
Arriving there over a century later, it was moving to see the lethal reefs guarding the entrance to the bay. And the little inlet just inside, where they dragged the James Caird ashore and spent their first night on land for sixteen days, sheltering in a little cave.
Of course that wasn’t the end of the story, because they still had to cross a whole range of unknown, unmapped mountains to get to the whaling stations on the north coast. That’s where we are going now – not trudging on foot on a desperate rescue mission, but travelling on skis, towing sledges laden with food, fuel, sleeping bags and modern tents.
Unlike Shackleton, Crean and Worsley, we have the luxury of being able to stop for the night to camp and rest, taking time to enjoy the fantastic glacial interior of South Georgia. It’s one of the most beautiful places on Earth, but it is made extra special by knowing who first crossed these mountains.
Pictures by Kenneth Perdigón
