Number in series 59; Year of publication 1966 - Fell and Rock ...

SUN, SNOW AND SILENCE
—A Journey Across Central Greenland on Ski
Roger Tufft
Last summer Roger Tufft, William Wallace, Dr. Hugh
Simpson and Mrs. Simpson crossed from the east to the
west coast of Greenland—the first unaided crossing of the
ice-cap since that of Nansen in 1888. The main purpose of
the crossing was to make a study of adrenal response to
prolonged physical stress. This is an account of their
400-mile journey.
In the summer of 1888, the young Norwegian, Fridtjof
Nansen, confounded his critics and astonished his contemporaries
by making the first crossing of the Greenland
ice-cap. Against all advice he crossed from the uninhabited
and virtually unknown east coast to the friendly, inhabited
west. However, delays in the pack ice had resulted in Nansen
abandoning his original plan of a crossing from Angmagssalik
to Christianshaab and taking instead a shorter and more
southerly route.
Since Nansen's time there have been numerous crossings of
the ice-cap with a variety of expeditions aided by dogs, ponies
and Weasels. No-one had repeated Nansen's achievement of
crossing using man-power only. However, techniques in
manhauling have improved almost as much as climbing since
1888 and it seemed by no means unreasonable therefore to
plan an unaided crossing along Nansen's original route.
Fortunately, Dr. Simpson who had done previous physiological
research in the Antarctic and Arctic, was able to obtain
a grant to study the effect of prolonged stress such as that
provided by a 400-mile manhauling journey. However, the
Danish government refused to give permission for us to
attempt the journey and certain authorities at home demurred
at backing a trip of such length, maintaining that it would be
impossible to carry sufficient food and fuel for the complete
crossing. Accordingly, we agreed to shorten our crossing by
descending from the ice-cap in the region of Sondre Strom
fiord whence we would complete the journey to Christianshaab
by canoe. (In fact, whilst not obstructing us, the Danes never
did give permission to make the crossing.)
On 12th June 1965 we left Glasgow for Reykjavik and the
next day flew by Dakota to Angmagssalik. Whilst still some