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Written by Paul Horrell
Try imagining a car journey that"s so hard it takes 100 years. A Hyundai Santa Fe has just crossed the Antarctic continent and back, a 360-mile epic that passes the South Pole both ways. This completed the expedition abandoned by Sir Ernest Shackleton in 1916.Shackleton"s trip made such a historical mark because of his heroism in pulling off one of history"s great rescues. This time around, the Hyundai was driven by Shackleton"s great-grandson, Patrick Bergel. A touching resonance.The Hyundai is the first passenger vehicle to make the crossing. In fact, before this expedition, no-one had done the full traverse rather than reaching the pole from one side of the continent or the other.Shackleton had made early attempts to get to the pole. But Roald Amundsen beat him to it in 1911. So did RF Scott, who got there a month later and perished returning. So in 1914, Shackleton planned a crossing of the continent, sending another ship, the Aurora, to McMurdo Sound on the Australian side of the continent, to lay supplies and collect the crossing party.The expedition foundered because his own ship, the Endurance, was trapped in ice on the South American side before they landed. The following spring the moving ice crushed its hull. That apparently sank their only way home.Shackleton was having none of that. He and five others took to the vicious ocean in a lifeboat, a ridiculously tiny 6-metre open sailboat, and set off on the 720-mile voyage to South Georgia to get help. On the way they rode out a hurricane. There they borrowed a bigger boat, heading back off to Antarctica and saving the whole Endurance party. That was August 1916, a year and a half after they"d first been bound in the ice.I needed to be confident in those working on the car. Antarctica wants to kill youSomeone senior in Hyundai liked the story, and wondered if one of their SUVs could make it through the crossing. Very sensibly, they realised it"d be a lamb to the slaughter if left unmodified. Even more sensibly they got Top Gear"s old friends at Arctic Trucks to do the fit-out.Once they"d got their plan in place, they approached Bergel (Shackleton"s great-grandson, don"t forget) to join in. "I was excited to be asked," he told Top Gear. "I"d grown up with Shackleton"s diaries, and the original expedition photos on my wall. But I needed to be confident - they had to be competent people. Antarctica wants to kill you."Once they told me Arctic Trucks and ALE, the logistics people, were involved I knew it was a serious proposition."Bergel isn"t an explorer. "I never let Shackleton weigh on me. I don"t want to live vicariously," he told me. He"s a technologist and creative entrepreneur. He invented the app Chirp!", which shares data skirting the need for wifi or networks or bluetooth by simply using sound. He"s since gone on to many other projects. "I guess, in common with the big man, I have a keen interest in destiny control."The Santa Fe"s body is engraved with the the signatures and good-luck messages of the descendants of several more of the Endurance crew. People who would never have been born were it not for the rescue.
Date written: 20 Apr 2017
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 7523
Try imagining a car journey that"s so hard it takes 100 years. A Hyundai Santa Fe has just crossed the Antarctic continent and back, a 360-mile epic that passes the South Pole both ways. This completed the expedition abandoned by Sir Ernest Shackleton in 1916.Shackleton"s trip made such a historical mark because of his heroism in pulling off one of history"s great rescues. This time around, the Hyundai was driven by Shackleton"s great-grandson, Patrick Bergel. A touching resonance.The Hyundai is the first passenger vehicle to make the crossing. In fact, before this expedition, no-one had done the full traverse rather than reaching the pole from one side of the continent or the other.Shackleton had made early attempts to get to the pole. But Roald Amundsen beat him to it in 1911. So did RF Scott, who got there a month later and perished returning. So in 1914, Shackleton planned a crossing of the continent, sending another ship, the Aurora, to McMurdo Sound on the Australian side of the continent, to lay supplies and collect the crossing party.The expedition foundered because his own ship, the Endurance, was trapped in ice on the South American side before they landed. The following spring the moving ice crushed its hull. That apparently sank their only way home.Shackleton was having none of that. He and five others took to the vicious ocean in a lifeboat, a ridiculously tiny 6-metre open sailboat, and set off on the 720-mile voyage to South Georgia to get help. On the way they rode out a hurricane. There they borrowed a bigger boat, heading back off to Antarctica and saving the whole Endurance party. That was August 1916, a year and a half after they"d first been bound in the ice.I needed to be confident in those working on the car. Antarctica wants to kill youSomeone senior in Hyundai liked the story, and wondered if one of their SUVs could make it through the crossing. Very sensibly, they realised it"d be a lamb to the slaughter if left unmodified. Even more sensibly they got Top Gear"s old friends at Arctic Trucks to do the fit-out.Once they"d got their plan in place, they approached Bergel (Shackleton"s great-grandson, don"t forget) to join in. "I was excited to be asked," he told Top Gear. "I"d grown up with Shackleton"s diaries, and the original expedition photos on my wall. But I needed to be confident - they had to be competent people. Antarctica wants to kill you."Once they told me Arctic Trucks and ALE, the logistics people, were involved I knew it was a serious proposition."Bergel isn"t an explorer. "I never let Shackleton weigh on me. I don"t want to live vicariously," he told me. He"s a technologist and creative entrepreneur. He invented the app Chirp!", which shares data skirting the need for wifi or networks or bluetooth by simply using sound. He"s since gone on to many other projects. "I guess, in common with the big man, I have a keen interest in destiny control."The Santa Fe"s body is engraved with the the signatures and good-luck messages of the descendants of several more of the Endurance crew. People who would never have been born were it not for the rescue.
Date written: 20 Apr 2017
More of this article on the Top gear website
ID: 7523
