Despite having to cut the expedition short, The Polar Row declared their adventure a rousing success. In a Facebook post, they revealed that they achieved 11 world records, traveled 521 nautical miles, and became the first rowing to reach such a Northerly latitude that they actually reached the permanent ice shelf.
Olympic Rower's Hands Age 400 Years During His Failed Expedition To Row To The North Pole
NY Post- Even Olympians aren’t immune from the ravages of mother nature.
That at least is the case for British Olympian Alex Gregory, who recently shared an image of his ravaged hands on Twitter.
Gregory, who is a two-time Olympic gold medalist and five-time world champion, picked up his horrific injuries while taking part in a charity rowing expedition in the Arctic Ocean.
The month-and-a-half-long journey was undertaken to break 12 world records while raising money for a school in the Himalayas, according to the New York Times.
At first, everything went well for the six crew members who took off from northeastern Norway on July 8. The Polar Row, as the expedition was called, achieved its first major goal by reaching the Svalbard archipelago, which sits between Norway and the North Pole. They then turned south towards Iceland.
That’s when things started to go wrong. Constant cloudy skies made their 30-foot boat’s solar panels useless. Eventually, their batteries completely drained and they were left without navigation equipment or power steering.
“Everything is grey. I’ve never been in a place where there is so much grey,” Gregory wrote in a bleak Facebook poston August 17.
“We never seem to be getting very far, nothing changes. Just greyness.”
“I’ve never been so wet and cold for so long. It’s seeping into my bones, there is absolutely no escape from it.”
Cold, wet and without any electronic aids, the expedition threw in the towel and headed for dry land. On August 19 they arrived on the tiny volcanic island of Jan Mayen where they planned to rest, recover and plan out their next move.
Despite receiving aid from the Norwegian Armed Forces and members of the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, the island’s only residents, four out of the six Polar Row crew members decided that enough was enough. Their health was not improving and they decided that they could not continue on to Iceland.
On August 29, Fiann Paul, captain of the Polar Row, officially announced that the expedition was at an end. Nearly a week later they finally made it off the island.
“The Polar Row crew and boat is now on mainland Norway!” the group wrote on their Facebook page.
In total, the expedition was stranded on the island for 15 days.
I guess we can add monster hands to the list of side-effects that arise when you try to tackle one of these completely unnecessary, ego-boosting extreme adventures. Monster hands, disappointment, and death are all consequences fused like barnacles to the hulls of every trans-world sailboat, rowboat, and inner-tube. When will these intrepid windbags learn their lesson? Stop trying so hard. Have you never seen “I’m Dying Up Here” on Showtime? Maybe skip that jaunt around the North Pole for a month on the couch with some good shows and a bottle of hand cream to keep those mitts/penis looking young.
Imagine being his girlfriend/wife? Would you let those fingers anywhere NEAR your private parts? Just one stroke of the labia and these cracked witch hands would turn your vagina into the well from The Ring. Anything that goes in, drowns.
PS- fortunately for those of us avoiding the touch of the night king, his hands came back to life after a few weeks:
PPS- “skin is an amazing thing!” = casual coffee banter between me and Nate