First Bike Expedition to the South Pole
The South Pole Epic was the first successful bike expedition to the South Pole. Daniel Burton, owner of Epic Biking, started on December 2, 2014 at Hercules inlet and biked about 750 miles from the edge of the Antarctic continent to the South Pole.
Route:
Daniel was dropped of at Hercules Inlet (S80º 0' W79º 38') by ski plane. Starting on the ice shelf he biked in a south west direction onto Antarctica. The first task was to go west to get around a crevasse field and then climb up into the interior of Antarctica towards Patriot Hills. ALE drags fuel from near Patriot Hills to the Thiel Mountains area where they refuel planes going to the South Pole. Daniel followed these tracks to the Thiel Mountains area. The Route then proceeded south with a little jog to the west to get around some crevasses at S87º 30', and then continued south to the South Pole.
Daniel - I just stumbled across your adventure because I had the same idea several years ago when I saw the fatbikes come out and thought someone might have a chance of riding a bike to the South Pole. I can imagine it is illegal for a record, but I'd rig up a sail! Good luck! I'll follow along virtually from Sheridan, WY.
ReplyDeleteDavid Haile
Actually people do use kites for South Pole expeditions. The prevailing winds are out of the south. I don't know anything about sailing, I guess it is possible to sail into a headwind, I however could not do it.
ReplyDeleteDaniel, I lived and worked at the south pole station for over a year from in 2011 and 2012. I had a pugsley fat bike and rode it a bit but only ended up putting a couple hundred miles on it due to the difficulty of floating in the loose unpacked snow. I wish you the best of luck, but I can tell you from experience, without serious attention to changing all the grease everything will freeze up, and riding with a laden bike in anything that's not well packed is going to be hell on earth (even at -40). Good luck, sir.
ReplyDeleteBy using a sloop rig, an airfoil is created and you can sail 30 degrees off the wind. The wind's passage essentially pulls you along. A kite can't sail up wind, but it could pull you home easily before the wind.
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