LOO-JW - Alone in Antarctica: The First Woman to Ski Solo Across the Southern Ice - page 46

the isolation. Being on the move I felt as comfortable as I ever
had on a polar journey.
I kept a close eye on the watch that I wore on the outside of
my jacket sleeve. In the austral summer when the sun is in the
sky twenty-four hours a day, the passage of time is difficult
to judge because the quality of the light never changes. The
sun never dips towards the horizon to create the golden light
of late afternoon or rises to give the blue light of morning,
it simply circles endlessly overhead. The time of day becomes
arbitrary because mid-afternoon looks and feels exactly like
mid-morning and there is no darkness whatsoever. Some find it
disorientating but I found that I preferred permanent daylight
to the normal division of day and night. When it was time to
sleep I simply pulled the hat I wore to bed over my eyes to
simulate darkness but if ever I woke up, it was always bright
enough to see.
I could choose any global timezone I wished and could ski as
long as I wanted but I had learnt that it was important to be
consistent; skipping back and forth between timezones quickly
confuses the body and is never a good idea. I needed a regular
rhythm and gave myself a specific time to get up each morning
and a regular time to stop skiing each day, allowing myself
enough sleep to let my body recover. If I was going to keep
going right the way across the continent, recuperation was
going to be as vital as mileage.
I was in a euphoric mood at the end of that first day but as
soon as I crawled into the glaucous world of my small tent the
nauseating sense of fear and trembling dread of the silence came
flooding back. In my tent there was no hiding from the reality
that I was alone. I boiled melted snow to make my dinner, a
freeze-dried meal in a foil bag, but I couldn't manage more