North Pole

so, we had bright weather, greta visibility, and the ice conditions were about as perfect as we might have wished for, no unpassable leads, no open water, no impassable pressure ridges, all things we might reasonable have expected. we also had positive drift that is the ice and tide were pushing us towards the pole, during the night we might move up to three kms at best but at least it was a couple, this was an amazing bonus. I saw the coordinates of last years trips most moved sideways two groups made no headway in nine days in one instance they had 20 kms negative drift one night alone that would have meant had they covered 18 kms in a day like we did the following morning they would be 2 kms behind where they were the day before hideous, we were without doubt very lucky indeed the conditions were perfect.

we reached the north pole 90 degrees at about 530 pm 5 days after we left barneo, half the time we might reasonably have expected, it was an incredible moment the gps going crazy you could actually see the world spinning beneath us, quickly as well, an amazing un repeatable sight we did it! we did it !amazing and a huge huge relief and excitement.
we put up our tents and spen the night at the north pole or soon down the other side as the positive drift swept us down the opposite side f the globe 2 miles during the night. we were picked up by a huge russian helicopter at 1 pm the following day and after 30 minutes stnding up in tis heli made it back to barneo hugely happy and very very releived and thankfull we had had such an incredible journey.
photos: me at north pole (shameless advertising

the heli and the interior of it...