Dispatches: The pressure's on! - Wednesday, 25th February 2004
Apparently 4,500 people live in Khatanga, the frozen fishing town where we have been based for the last 48 hours, but you wouldn't know it. The whole place seems in hibernation, except for three children dressed in oversize coats kicking a football over a patch of grey ice outside our hotel. The temperature is hovering around -35°C and our nostrils begin to freeze as soon as we step outside to walk to the store room. The air is so dry that static constantly builds up and electric shocks are commonplace.
My kit is spread out over the lobby of the hotel and we are working hard to make the final adjustments before loading the helicopter (an aging MI8, the workhorse of the Russian military). Skins are being attached to skis, runners to pulks and ties to zips. Tony and I have constant debates about what I can afford to leave behind (spare pants) and what I can't (spare phone aerial). The camera crew have started to argue about who snores the loudest and doing their own portrayal of Michael Jackson's Thriller, and people wonder why I want to cross the Arctic alone!
We are due to fly tomorrow but whether we do is subject to the vagaries of Russian aviation; if we do fly we must be ready. I only get one chance at this and the success of the expedition rests as much on what we do now as what I do out on the ice. The pressure's on!
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