Follow That Musk Ox: Tales from Milne Land

By Adrian Hall

With a plump redundancy cheque burning a hole in his pocket and an opportunity, in the absence of time-demanding gainful employment, to go off into the wide blue yonder, the author joined an expedition to Milne Land, a remote island in the depths of Scoresby Sund, the world’s largest fjord in East Greenland.

This book gives an entertaining and light-hearted account of his travels to this Arctic paradise. Perfect for any armchair explorer!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9781326619855

Book preview

Follow That Musk Ox: Tales from Milne Land

Follow That Musk Ox: Tales from Milne Land

Adrian Hall

Copyright Statement

Copyright © 2016 by Adrian Hall

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the author.

ISBN 978-1-326-61985-5

Map of the Scoresby Sund region of East Greenland

Map of western Milne Land

Chapter 1

The monitor showed that there were just five flights left to depart that evening: to Rome, Shanghai, Moscow, Reykjavik and Prague. I sat and observed my fellow travellers over the top of a near-empty beer glass. The noisy crowds milling excitedly round the shops and snack bars had thinned considerably over the course of the last hour or so. To alleviate the boredom of waiting, I tried to guess the destination of passers-by. Four immaculately dressed men strode into the now empty seating area below my vantage point. Each of them was towing a small black case on wheels of the type preferred by those who turn left on entering airplanes the world over and each wore a pair of conspicuously expensive sunglasses despite the lateness of the hour and comprehensive absence of sunlight. Although their conversation was out of earshot, the meaning of many of their theatrical hand gestures and facial expressions were plainly evident. It was my considered opinion that these gentlemen were travelling to Rome. Others proved rather more difficult to pin down. How could you make an educated guess at where trainers, jeans and t-shirt boy was heading?

Tiring of the game, I leant back on my stool and swilled the remaining now warm beer in the glass, swashing the froth from the sides, and considered having another. This would be my last opportunity to partake of an alcoholic beverage, or at least one that could conceivably appear in the same sentence as the phrase reasonably priced. I was caught on the horns of a dilemma and ruminated on the pros and cons of the situation. On the one hand, the enjoyment to be had from one more pint was beyond question. But this had to be balanced against the certain knowledge that I would pay for my unfettered hedonism with the inevitable urge to visit the plane’s comfort facilities the instant the fasten seatbelts sign was illuminated. Glancing up I noticed that the monitor’s display had changed. Its unequivocal message was that flight FI455 was boarding and that I should proceed to the gate. Gulping down the remaining beer in one large, frog-cheeked mouthful, I shouldered my rucksack and headed off.

My journey was starting, well this part of it anyway. In reality, the venture had started some months previously. Back on a damp and dreary autumnal morning in a nondescript office in a provincial city, I’d just been informed that several years of safe, if admittedly largely humdrum, employment were about to come to an abrupt end. As the nice lady from HR droned on about progress, efficiency, global economy, I looked distractedly out of the window at the leaves swirling around the neighbouring supermarket car park, at shoppers hoisting one carrier bag after another from trolley to boot, at the funereal-paced procession of cars, drivers hunting for an elusive space. I should do something, I thought, something…special.

On the wall, between the year planner and staff holiday chart on one side and the Norwich City Football Club calendar on the other was a large map of the world. Its original purpose had simply been to add a splash of colour to an otherwise drab expanse of magnolia. But its presence had succeeded in precipitating daydreams during duller workplace hours. I could stare absent-mindedly at the great blue splashes of ocean and intricate multi-colour patchwork of sovereign states for unfeasibly long periods of time. Occasionally, a notion would enter my head which would entail a closer examination, prompting me to get off my backside and walk over to the portal to places exotic, to squint at a wild archipelago or a remote mountain range and wonder what it was like there.

In a moment of clarity, it dawned on me that the map was the key. My end-of-era marking big thing should be to go somewhere special. Suddenly the car park held no interest as I focused my gaze intently on the wall mounted space filler. In a few months’ time I’d have a plump redundancy cheque burning a hole in my pocket and an opportunity, in the absence of time-demanding gainful employment, to go off into the wide blue yonder, to one of the obscure locations that had held my slack-jawed gaze on countless occasions. But where?

I’ve always been fascinated by polar exploration. Not the modern day stuff where a rescue flight is just a satellite phone call away or where ever more contrived ways of retracing old paths hold sway. No, my taste was for tales of exploration from a more romantic era. A band of plucky adventurers picking a course through the endlessly shifting pack ice, on their way to taking the first steps on frigid lands unknown. Marvellous stuff! Mind you, a good dollop of hardship and privation always helped the narrative along. Teeth falling out of blackened scurvy-ridden gums, gangrenous frost-bitten digits, hunger so gnawing that one’s boots become a viable meal option. Oh yes, I could take it all, bring it on! From the comfort of my armchair, I had marched head down through many a blizzard. With nothing but a nice cup of hot chocolate and a hob nob to sustain me.

My interest was probably first sparked by a children’s book on perhaps the most famous polar explorer of them all. In recent times his reputation and accomplishments have been the object of intense scrutiny, but when the Ladybird Book entitled Captain Scott: An Adventure from History was published, Sir Robert Falcon Scott was still lionised as a model of grit in the face of adversity. The story of his heroic failure was well known to me, the reading and rereading of the book’s text held no particular interest, it was the illustrations that grabbed my attention and fired my imagination. I could sit and look at the beautifully painted pictures for hours: their ship caught in the Antarctic ice, Oates’ ponies, men hauling sledges, a tiny tent in a howling windswept sea of white. I’d always fancied doing something like that, although admittedly, the dying at the end bit wasn’t so appealing.

How feasible would it be to do a bit of exploring? As is the modern way, a few searches on Google began to throw up suggestions. Going to the either of the poles themselves was soon discounted. Principally, and categorically, on the grounds of cost. The North Pole is a fairly arbitrary point in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. Ice breakers now regularly carry well-heeled tourists through the pack to the pole for their once in a lifetime experience. If you want to put a bit more effort in, you can be dropped off by plane to ski the last degree and then be picked up again a few days later. Both options are bowel-looseningly expensive. The South Pole, by contrast, sits atop a huge plateau on the planet’s most remote and challenging continent. Getting to the South Pole is a Herculean logistical, not to mention physical, task and really is best left to blokes in survival suits covered with corporate sponsor logos. As a less energetic alternative, it’s also possible to fly over the South Pole on specially chartered daytrip flights from Australia. An underwhelming climax to a brief trip sandwiched between Bruce and Sheila didn’t have that certain something I was looking for. If you can make do with the periphery of Antarctica rather than its geographical star turn, then the options for cruising round in floating gin palaces in the company of retired dentists from Delaware are manifold.

So the poles were out of the running, but what about bits nearby? The Arctic Ocean is fringed by a plethora of islands and lonely shorelines. Canada and Russia take the lion’s share, Norway and the USA (by virtue of Alaska) also get their place at the table. But the place that caught my eye and indeed fancy, was the large wedge-shaped landmass sitting slap bang at centre top of the map, Greenland. My pulse raced, could this be the answer? Before launching into an internet searching frenzy, I leant back and considered what I knew about the place. Well, pause for dramatic effect, it is mostly covered by an ice cap, second in size only to that covering Antarctica, I believe. The Vikings had gone there and christened it with a somewhat misleading name. Fridtjof Nansen had been the first person to cross it. Inuit peoples live there to this day. So, in short, not a lot.

Searching the internet for items on Greenland generated a wide variety of interest areas, shall we say. From real estate opportunities and lovely ladies on webcams who could chat to me right now on the less useful side of things to entries rather more pertinent to the task in hand. Adding terms such as explore to the search generated listings of companies that, for a fee, could indeed take you on an adventure to Greenland. A lot of these still seemed to be based largely on cruising around in boats and that still wasn’t really what I was after, I wanted rucksacks and tents, real explorer stuff. When I tried adding trekking into the mix I hit pay dirt! There, writ large in big bold blue letters, was the entry for Tangent Expeditions. One more click and I was in.

The company’s real focus is on organising climbing expeditions. Greenland has an awful lot of something that is highly prized amongst the climbing fraternity, unclimbed peaks. There is a certain extra buzz, not to mention kudos, to be gained from standing atop a remote lofty peak that no-one has ever scaled before. Your own little bit of climbing history. Recently, Tangent had started to organise trekking expeditions. These were to locations with terrain which looked rather more like Scotland than the Great Ranges, but areas which were, nonetheless, truly remote with precious few previous visitors. This was decidedly more like it. The trekking expedition for the forthcoming summer was to journey to Milne Land. If you have never heard of the place, fret not gentle reader, for you will be one of the overwhelming majority of normal folk who are equally oblivious to its existence. It transpired that Milne Land is a remote island located in the inner most depths of the World’s largest fjord some way above the Arctic circle. The expedition would travel to the far western end of the island for trekking, scrambling and possible first ascents of unclimbed peaks. Music to my ears! This was just what I had been looking for. Remote, that sounded good. Could it even, perhaps, stretch to inhospitable or even where only the bravest of soul’s dare to tread? A few e-mails to Paul, the company’s eminently knowledgeable and likeable founder, backed up by a couple of phone calls, and the decision was made. Medical forms enquiring about my past exposure to a bewildering array of ailments were completed and sent back to Tangent with the first of a series of sharp-intake-of-breath cheques. This was it, real explorer stuff on a plate (a plastic one, obviously, to save weight).

With the passing months, more monies were dispatched and a get together of participants was organised, a get-to-know-you session in a pub in Oxenholme on the edge of Kendal, itself in the outskirts of the Lake District, Tangent’s home base. Kendal, like most other places in fairness, is a long drive from Norwich and necessitated a very early start and two Little Chef pick-me-ups en route. But an urge to meet my fellow campers and a merciful scarceness of other road users made the drive a pleasant and undemanding one. I pulled into the pub car park at virtually the same time as Paul who came over and introduced himself. He told me a table had been booked for lunch. I’d already polished off an Olympic Breakfast plus sundry other snacks of the road and wasn’t remotely hungry. Nevertheless, it would be rude to not partake… Already present were Jim, Tangent’s leader for the expedition and his wife Sandy who would be accompanying us. Jim had a wiry frame, a warm smile and a healthily weathered face that defied accurate estimation of its owner’s age. Somewhere in between fifty and sixty-five was about as good a guess as I could manage. Sandy was of similarly sprightly appearance and subsequent conversation suggested this was in no small part attributable to spending large dollops of time doing healthy outdoor things, Tangent expeditions in the summer, lengthy spells of cross country skiing in the winter. Tom, a very personable Englishman who had spent so many years north of the border that he spoke with a definite Caledonian twang was accompanied by his wife who wouldn’t be joining us on the trip. With a shock of white hair, Tom made no secret of the fact that he was approaching retirement and, like me, looking for an adventure.  Our merry band was completed by a husband and wife pair of doctors from Glasgow, the presence of whose obvious medical training was somewhat comforting. A comprehensive list of kit to be taken was distributed and dissected item by item. Some things were the responsibility of the individual to supply, others would be provided by Tangent. I was relieved to find out I wouldn’t need to take my own rifle! Glasses and plates were cleared from the table to make way for maps and aerial photographs of the area we would hopefully make for. A bay near the island’s western tip was suggested as a likely looking drop-off point and all present agreed with its selection.

With the prospect of a lengthy return drive ahead of me, I bade farewell to my new comrades and hit the road. A smile played across my face for the entirety of the journey. Once home, partner Vicky and daughter Phoebe did their level best to humour me and my single topic of conversation. Shared glances between them suggested that they might not find the subject as plainly riveting as I did.

Time continued to pass. An e-mail out of the blue from Paul informed interested parties that the medics had pulled out of the trip on account of the imminent arrival of a new set of tiny Glaswegian feet. Sometime later another unexpected message from Tangent stated that the expedition had a last minute new member, the mysterious Doug. Obviously there wasn’t going to be the opportunity to meet the new addition before the trip started, our first encounter would excitingly be in foreign climes. On the work front, things were winding down as final payoff day came ever closer. With a soon to be greatly enlarged bank balance I felt confident to make forays to the alluring realms of outdoor suppliers and camping shops. Most of the stuff detailed on the kit list I already had, but the thought of purchasing the remainder helped to compound the sense of imminent adventure with which I was now flush, and put a distinct spring in my step.

Until one fateful day, that is. Exactly five weeks before departure I was enjoying an enthusiastic, if talent-lite, game of tennis with a friend when the ball was launched over the fence surrounding the court to join the numerous others that had already found their way there during the course of the evening. Facing a now serious ball deficit, I volunteered to go and retrieve them. Jogging round the outside of the fence I felt a strange twanging sensation in my right knee. How odd! I thought at the first step, how bloody bloody blinking flippingly painful I thought at the next. Having had a far from esteemed Sunday league football career blighted in its latter years by a succession of knee injuries, a Gazza style anterior cruciate ligament rupture being the pick of the bunch, I had developed a certain appreciation for the finer points of things going wrong in the knee joint. And this felt very wrong indeed. My immediate self-diagnosis was a knackered cartilage or a meniscal tear in more correct medical parlance. A couple of these had featured previously in my personal gamut of orthopaedic woes. My first and only thought was whether or not the trip to Milne Land was still on. As I limped home, I feared the worse.

An appointment with my GP the following day confirmed my suspicions. All the symptoms pointed to a meniscal tear. Downbeat but not crest fallen I had one trump card to play. My term of employment would cease in twelve days but until that time I was covered by the company’s medical insurance scheme. A quick telephone call to the insurer confirmed that yes, if I could arrange for all treatment to be completed by the last day of my employment, I would be covered and that they would pick up the tab. A telephone call to the secretary of a consultant suggested by my GP confirmed that I could see him the next day. In his well-appointed rooms I described the circumstances of the injury and, more importantly, the finite limit of the insurance cover. He pulled and prodded the lower limb and said that his suspicion was indeed a meniscal tear but that an MRI scan would be required to confirm the diagnosis. It just so happened that an appointment could be made for the following day and why don’t we book you in for surgery next week, just in case. Money, even if its not your own, talks.

And so, with three full days to spare, I found myself being wheeled down a hospital corridor, staring up at the on-off succession of strip lights, towards an arthroscopic procedure to rid me of the troublesome torn bit of cartilage. I did my best to appear unruffled by the activities in the preparation room but, as someone with a pathological fear of needles, I made a fist as requested, scrunched my eyes tight shut and bit an oversized mouthful of pillow as the scratch on the back of my hand was followed by an icy tingling sensation passing up my arm. The next thing I knew I was back in bed, knee swaddled in an enormous bandage, waiting for the consultant to call in with the all clear to go home. Comfortingly, he informed me that all had gone well and that the main thing to guard against was infection until the wounds healed completely. Get the joint moving again as soon as possible, regular exercise but not too strenuous at first. With a visibly trembling bottom lip I asked him if I would be OK to travel to Greenland? The response was an assured yes. Take a few paracetamol and a length of tubigrip and you’ll be fine. Have a good time. And with that he was gone.

Show-me-the-money! day came with the biggest cheque I had ever seen being passed from my shaking hand to the safety of my bank account. The mother of all drinking sessions that culminated in an I think I’d be most comfortable sleeping on the hall floor with all my clothes on tonight, if you don’t mind conclusion marked the end of my association with the company, God bless ‘em! Yesterday I had been a wage slave, today I was an explorer, albeit one with a thick head and queasy inability to look downwards.

I could now throw myself into recuperation and last minute preparations. The former largely consisted of sunbathing in the back garden, interspersed with the odd bike ride or two. The latter became an obsession. Whilst the big things on the kit list, the tent, the sleeping bag and their ilk, were all accounted for, a whole raft of items that could loosely be grouped under personal hygiene and associated sundries remained to be purchased. With an almost infinite amount of time on my hands, I was able to throw myself into finding the most cost effective solutions. Nervous shop assistants in Boots and Superdrug would try to avoid eye contact as I furiously scribbled the price of baby wipes, sun tan lotion and plasters into a notebook. These were compared with their out of town competition on lengthy forays to ASDA, Tesco and Sainsburys. In all, I must have saved seven, perhaps even eight pounds in the course of my relentless bargain hound pursuit. That I had probably spent considerably more than that on petrol is mere detail.

At long last the day of departure dawned. And dawned considerably earlier than I had been accustomed to rising of late. Phoebe was going on a school trip to France and it was decided that I would take her to the meeting point. I had expected a tearful parting, perhaps Phoebe might even have joined in, but in the event it failed to materialise. Although a departing dad was obviously a bummer, the prospect of a lengthy coach trip with mates from school more than compensated for it. I had lined up a solemn speech of the You know I love you every much and while I’m away… variety. However, as soon as the school gates came into view and friends stared waving and shouting, Phoebe was out of the car door with a peck on the cheek and Bye Dad, have a great time… trailing behind her.

The drive down to the airport was on a stiflingly hot afternoon. Sitting in stationary queuing traffic on the M25 was made worse by a feature of our car, namely the need to keep the heater on full blast when not moving to stop the engine from overheating. We crawled from queue to queue at walking place, flashing 40 signs a cruel joke. After an age, we passed Concorde and the grimy tunnel and emerged in the modern day Utopia that is Heathrow Terminals 1-3. By the time we pulled up, I had decided in advance to keep our sweet parting as brief as possible. Vicky would be upset, I knew as much, who wouldn’t be with a me-shaped hole in their life, albeit a temporary one. As we kissed, I noticed a tear form in her eye. I told her, reassuringly, that I would be back soon. "It’s not you. It’s the thought of having to sit through those bloody road works again! Somehow that made me feel much better. I smiled, turned and headed off on my great adventure.

Chapter 2

Illuminated fasten seat belt signs went out, triggering a mass clicking of buckles, pulling on of jackets and hurried stuffing of sundry items into bags and pockets. Filing past the fixed smiles and cheery ‘goodbyes’ of the cabin crew, I could see that the sun was trying its very hardest to linger above the horizon for a few more minutes, the western sky ablaze with autumnal reds and golds. Being an international flight, immigration and passport control was an unwanted but inevitable precursor to onward progress. Given the lateness of the hour and the relatively small number of flights arriving, the size of the queue snaking back from the booths was depressingly fulsome. Joining the rear of the shortest one, I waited and waited and waited some more without moving. Normally you’d expect to at least shuffle along, idly kicking any unfortunate pieces of baggage you couldn’t be arsed to carry, but the nose bleed inducing speed of shuffling would have been beyond the wildest dreams of the poor wretches standing hunched and muttering before me. A sudden lurch caught me by surprise, a single figure, having finished the written treatise on Iceland’s place in the modern world that all visitors are presumably required to complete on arrival, ambled past the booth, a faint smile on his weary face. The queue took one step forward in a sort of walking Mexican wave. And so we proceeded, wait, ripple of movement, wait, ad nauseum. On finally reaching the Stand Here! line I presented myself in front of a uniformed and extravagantly moustachioed man who obviously took great pleasure from his very important job. Without looking up, a hand was extended into which I placed my passport. Turning to the page graced by my Adonis-like portrait photograph he suddenly stared at me, unblinkingly, for rather longer than felt comfortable or appropriate, his blank expression showing all the emotional range of a disinterested sheep. Presently his gaze was diverted to a computer screen and bouts of staccato key thumping were punctuated by over long periods of silence whilst I looked alternately at him, my passport on the desk and the floor. Why are you visiting Iceland? he abruptly inquired. My first urge was to grab those polyester epaulettes and tell him that I had made this journey solely to experience the legendary Nordic welcome for which the country is rightly world famous. Deciding against this, I informed him that I was on my way to Greenland. More silence. Which went on for a bit. Where are you staying in Iceland? Snorris Guesthouse in Reykjavik. For how many days will you stay? I leave on Saturday, so that’s one day, I suppose. Or two nights, because I’m staying there tonight and tomorrow night. Which is Friday night. So that’s two days, I eloquently replied. Eyes still locked on the computer screen, an arm was extended in slow motion, stopping just in front of my chest. With thumb and forefinger, I retrieved my passport. Next!. I am fully aware that it not part of the immigration official’s lot to present a happy smiley persona to the potential ne’er do wells trying to weasel their way into their homeland but I’ve often thought that the job must appeal to a certain type of person. Someone with deep-seated self-esteem issues perhaps. As I walked past the booth I couldn’t help conjuring up images of a wheezing be-shorted Icelandic lad, eyes reddened and cheeks streaked with tears, desperately trying to retrieve his schoolbag from the toilet block roof to the soundtrack of cruel laughter from his mocking classmates, a deeply unhappy child nurturing dreams of petty officialdom and payback time.

Having experienced the full joys of an extended queue at passport control, it came as little surprise that there was no sign of the baggage from our flight on the carousel indicated by the screen. I joined the milling throng and resigned myself to the customary