High-end hobbies – trekking in Scott’s footsteps

Tuesday, April 19, 2011 | Posted by: Fiona Cullinan
Categories: Personal | Tags: HNWIs, HNWI, Bespoke, magazine, Bespoke magazine, hobbies, Roger Weatherby, trek, South Pole, challenge, Antarctic, Scott

Trekking to the South Pole is hard, but not quite hard enough for some. In the fourth of our unusual hobbies posts, Glyn Brown talks to Roger Weatherby, CEO of Weatherbys Bank, who made the journey using the Victorian equipment and clothing that Scott would have used.

A sporting challenge
“I don’t find it all that easy to keep fit,” says Roger Weatherby, chief executive of Weatherbys Bank, one of only two family-owned private banks left in the UK, “so I like to have a sporting challenge, something a bit different.”

Hmmm. There’s sport, extreme sport – then there’s the kind of undertaking that gives the term ‘physical endurance’ a nightmarish new meaning. Something Roger and three of his friends know about, because in 2005, these urbane white-collar professionals trekked to the South Pole, re-creating the last 170 miles of Captain Scott’s epic 1912 journey.

Not just that, but they did it with replicas of Scott’s equipment and provisions, right down to beaver-skin mitts and bars of pemmikan (a mix of fruit and congealed fat best described as insufferable). The weather at the Pole is savage; dangers included frostbite, snow blindness, altitude sickness and a wind chill of -70˚C.

Trekking for a cause
The idea came from Roger’s pal, Simon Daglish, whose wife had just given birth to their second child, Felix – premature and affected by cerebral palsy. Daglish learned there were no funds for research into the condition; the trek could help raise some. Of course, other people have walked to the Pole. The edge was that no one since Scott had done it with Victorian kit.

Well, you think, these guys will die on the first day. But all were ex-army officers, graduates of Sandhurst. Roger, 44 at the time, had also run the Sahara’s gruelling 243km Marathon des Sables.

Admiration for Scott
His companions – marketing director Daglish, then 40; property management guru James Daly, then 41; and investment banker Ed Farquhar, 39 – had done everything from row the Irish Sea to race in the Cresta Run. They took as their guide Geoff Somers, MBE, 54 and a Polar veteran. They also took their admiration for Scott, whose doomed party arrived at the Pole only to find the Norwegian flag Roald Amundsen had put there a month before.

On their return, Scott and his team froze to death. Says Roger: “Scott’s press has been mixed. This was a chance to see how the equipment affected that outcome.”

Reindeer sleeping bags, sealskin boots, half-ton sleds
And it did. Amundsen used dogs, while Scott’s team, like Roger’s, man-hauled a half-ton sled whose runners froze to the snow.

“You have to strain against it,” he says. “The first day it didn’t move – we looked at each other in disbelief, thinking, who’s not pulling?” Taking longer, Scott’s gear would have started to rot.

“We had sealskin boots insulated with hay – which soaks up moisture, because hauling a sled, you sweat, then as soon as you stop, you freeze – but our boots were already going downhill. Reindeer sleeping bags – quite cosy, really – got sweat-soaked at night and froze solid by day. More and more effort to thaw the things out, and Scott’s would’ve been less and less warm…”

‘It’s boring!’
Having prepared by sleeping in the deep freeze of an ice-sculpting company and dragging tyres through parks, they set off on 22 December, 2004. Progress was slow, one exhausting mile an hour.

“And it’s boring, that’s what took me by surprise. There’s nothing on the plateau, so you can’t think we’ll pull to that rock and rest. The same vista, day in, day out.” You can’t even sing? “Nope.” Laughs? “Wind’s too loud, and you’d get ice round your mouth We thought we’d have all this thinking time to invent great business ideas, but because of the cold, your brain’s working so slowly; it can only come up with limited things.”

Frozen assets?
The worst part, however, was what Roger has called The Art of Polar Squatting – doing the necessary in a climate where exposed flesh can freeze within 10 seconds. “Meticulous planning was vital.”

Finally, on 14 January, the team reached the Pole to a rousing reception from the 50 scientists based there – and knew that they’d raised £400,000 for charity. The horror was over. Did they celebrate?

“Oh yes. The pemmikan was filthy stuff, so food had dominated our thoughts – food and hunger. We celebrated by having some toast.” A grin. “And that was quite sufficient, it was wonderful.”

Feature: © Glyn Brown. Image: © Shinsain. 

This article appeared in the Winter 2010 issue of Bespoke magazine, which you can either download as a PDF or receive in print format. Here’s how you can sign up to receive future editions of Bespoke. Our Summer 2011 issue will be out shortly.

You might also find these posts useful:

* Bespoke magazine – the adventurous read for HNWIs
* Read more in our series of high-end hobbies
* Read posts about Protecting your wealth