Adventure Magazine

Someone who knows you well how do you think that they

would describe you.? This is from Laura Andrews: Mike is this

incredible guy who’s got a contagious belief that everything is

possible. Despite being a legend himself, he builds everyone else

up around him, making them feel like Olympian’s and inspiring

them to expand themselves. He’s sarcastic, jokey and positive.

He’s incredibly humble, super switched on, and lives life well for

every moment. Mikes is incredibly capable, he has a novel worth

of crazy experiences behind him. The amazing thing is that he can

do these adventures and capture it as the same time. The aweinspiring

content inspires, educates and connects.

"Mike is this

incredible

guy who’s

got a

contagious

belief that

everything is

possible."

How did you become part of this expedition? The expedition

was put on by the Antarctic Heritage Trust — The trust is a New

Zealand-based not-for-profit that cares for the expedition base

huts and approx. 20,000 artefacts left behind by early Antarctic

explorers including Captain Robert Scott, Sir Ernest Shackleton

and Sir Edmund Hillary. The reason for this expedition is to

celebrate 150 years since the birth, Roald Amundsen, who in 1911

became the first person to reach the geographic South Pole. Our

team was a joint New Zealand and Norwegian expedition with

3 kiwis and 2 Norwegians. It's the trust's sixth major Inspiring

Explorers Expedition following a crossing of South Georgia in

2015, an ascent of Mount Scott in Antarctica in 2017, a successful

crossing of the Greenland ice cap in 2018, and kayaking

expeditions on the Antarctic Peninsula in 2019 and 2020.

What training if any did you do and how much lead up time

did you have? Skiing 1000km in Antarctica wasn’t something I

knew a lot about and it was completely different from whitewater

kayaking so the preparation was a huge task. I guess the easiest

way to look at it was getting conditioned to be on your feet all

day for 50 days towing a sled and the strain this would put on

your body. I think [the sled] was about 85kgs at its peak. It was

definitely heavy.

To do this I was towing tires as much as possible around in the

bush in New Zealand to try and replicate the drag on my muscles.

Then obviously the gym and keeping fit. It's interesting doing

something like this when you don't have a lot of experience or

know what it's going to be like in terms of the environment or the

toll on the body. It was a huge learning curve, just operating in

that environment under that fatigue day in day out. The other side

of preparation was trying to figure out the equipment, and how

you're going to stay warm and access things on your sled during

the day. If there's a big storm or it's really cold you can't take

your gloves off so you need to learn how to do that with them on.

Even thinking about stuff as simple as what kind of food to take

because most things freeze — these are little bits you need to

figure out before you get on the ice.

Most of your successes have been sitting down how was

the challenge of a walking/standing challenge? Whitewater

kayaking is fast-paced. When you’re out on a kayak mission

you’re constantly solving the puzzle of Whitewater in front of you.

Scouting, setting safety, and then running rapids. It comes at

you all day. Skiing across Antarctica is completely different. The

pace on the snow is slow. Often we were moving around 2,5km

per hour with our goal being prioritizing keeping the team healthy

and in the best condition to continue moving for 50 days on end.

There’s definitely a lot of risks operating in the polar environment,

but it’s a slow burn and can be managed much easier than the

dynamic environment of the river.

The train never stops as Auckland firefighter Laura Andrews navigates the team away from the Ronne Ice

shelf and into the interior of the continent, across yet another wide open plain of majestic Antarctic scenery.

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