Pole to Pole (BBC Books)

by Michael Palin (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1997

  $3.44

• Used

  Paperback
  2009

  $3.44

  No.1 bestseller Michael Palin's epic journey from the North Pole to the South Pole. 'The cracked and fissured ice-pack offers no comfortable reassurance - no glimmer of any reward to the traveller who has made his way to the top of the world. The Arctic Ocean, known to the Victorians as the Sea of Ancient Ice, stares balefully back as we descend towards it, reflecting nothing but the question: Why?' Michael Palin's adventure begins when he is enrolled in the Royal and Ancient Polar Bear Society...Travelling by train, truck, raft, Ski-Doo, barge, balloon and bicycle, Michael Palin experiences every extreme the world has to offer. Braving the cold grip of the Arctic Circle, and the swirling snowstorms of Spitsbergen, Palin has to cope with friendly locals, occasional gunfire and his own unruly digestive system before he can finally stand in Scott's shoes at the South Pole, in the Land of the Midnight Sun.

• Used

  Hardcover
  1992

  $3.44

  Following Around the World in 80 Days , this book accompanies Michael Palin's second travel series on BBC Television. It is a record of his continuous land and sea journey from the North Pole to the South Pole, following a given line of longitude - 30 degrees East. Air travel is allowed only as a last resort. The line of travel follows as closely as possible existing roads, rivers, railways and shipping routes, and for the most part the means of transport is provided by trains, trucks, ships, rafts, sledges, skidoos, buses, barges, bicycles and balloons. The difficulty, and the enjoyment, lie in accepting and overcoming the limitations which man and nature impose on an abstract line around the globe. The route is remarkably rich and varied. It embraces, amongst others, the CIS, Turkey, Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and South Africa. It starts and ends at the frozen poles and crosses the Equator, passing through such cities as St Petersburg, Istanbul, Luxor and Johannesburg. Palin and his crew witnessed history in the making during their journey, such as the end of communism in the USSR and the end of apartheid in South Africa.