Explorers complete Shackleton’s epic Antarctic journey

A team of exhausted but elated explorers successfully recreated Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic survival journey on Monday, completing a three-day climb across mountains despite a treacherous blizzard.

Expedition leader Tim Jarvis and Barry Gray reached the old whaling station at Stromness early on Monday after a 900-metre climb over the mountainous interior of South Georgia.

“It was epic, really epic, and we’ve arrived here against the odds,” said Jarvis, who with Gray completed the climb using the same kind of clothing and gear that Shackleton and his men would have worn in 1916.

“The ice climb at the Tridents is a serious thing and Shackleton didn’t exaggerate -- with ice at 50 degrees, with one wrong foot, we could have careened down a crevasse.”

Jarvis, 46, said he and Gray, 38, had more than 20 crevasse falls up to their knees during the climb with the latter plunging into one up to his armpits, requiring their one-man support crew to help pull him free.

“These early explorers were iron men in wooden boats and while modern man mostly travel around in iron vessels, I hope we’ve been able to emulate some of what they achieved,” he said.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that everyone has a Shackleton double in them and I hope we’ve inspired a few people to find theirs.”