For more than a month alone in the middle of Antarctica, Caroline Côté braved a “gigantic white plateau,” the cold, the wind, the snow, the dizzying fog, “the infinite silence,” and feared “terrible” injuries. while she enjoyed the pure freedom and the warm taste of butter and chocolate. All while setting a world record.
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A year ago, the 37-year-old Quebecer made her final preparations before experiencing life in the south, where there is not a living soul. No polar bears, no predators, no “traffic lights or one-way streets, traffic or honking.” Than nature, which can rebel without warning.
She covered the 1,138 kilometers between Hercules Inlet (starting point for several Antarctic expeditions) and the South Pole in complete autonomy in 33 days, 2 hours and 53 minutes. Sweden's Johanna Davidsson did it in 38 days and 23 hours. A journey that Côté tells in all its simplicity in his second book “The Call of Antarctica”.
“It was harder every day. I put pressure on myself by telling myself that I had already done all this, so I had to do it [continuer pour] breaking the record,” she explains in a generous interview with the Journal.
She didn't like winter
Caroline Côté remembers not liking the winter in Quebec. She didn't like shoveling snow [sa] “Driving” or “walking in the mud” and she didn’t dress properly, which prevented her from enjoying it. She has learned to tame it.
“I’m actually cold! But if you take the time to dress well, it's great to do physical activity in temperatures below -20 degrees Celsius. We’re hot.”
Her love for this season grew so much that she met the man of her life, Vincent Colliard, a Frenchman whom she met during an expedition to Antarctica in 2019. Her marriage in Norway was also “in the freezer.”
After that, you have no other choice to enjoy the winter! And there is no mention of an all-inclusive hotel in the south.
lonliness
As an introvert, she never thought loneliness would be such a challenge. Negative thoughts surfaced and she had to “unplug” to move on.
“The first 10 days are okay. But the more it progressed, the more I questioned myself, thoughts really take up a lot of space. It's easy to become negative, you lose a lot of energy. “It was the worst in the middle of the expedition because we can’t see the end,” she says in her quiet voice and speaks of a “constant struggle.”
Ironically, solitude now allows him to appreciate human contact more.
“I know how valuable it is to be with someone. “My listening skills have improved significantly,” notes the endurance athlete, who takes part in competitions of up to 154 km.
Caroline Côté at the start of her expedition to the South Pole in December 2022. Photo provided by Caroline Côté
“Polar Thighs”
Before leaving, Caroline Côté feared frostbite, which “could end the expedition.” The best prevention is sun protection, especially in a world where there is sun 24 hours a day. She forgot it once. Result: frostbite on the cheeks. A mistake she didn't repeat.
She also wanted to avoid “polar legs.” With prolonged exposure to very cold temperatures – up to -35 degrees Celsius, not counting the influence of wind – “the skin deteriorates and rots”. Indoors, the situation can become worse if the wounds become infected.
“This is disgusting! It leaves huge marks and can lead to amputation. I've seen photos and it's terrible,” says the one who didn't suffer any major injuries.
Portrait of the adventure filmmaker Caroline Côté during a polar expedition. Photo provided by Caroline Côté
“A deadly factor”
Even if you are well prepared to reduce risks in a hostile environment by studying the terrain and identifying crevasses, the wind remains enemy number one.
“In two minutes it can become a deadly factor,” says the adventure filmmaker.
She wished that this trip had been made into a documentary, but she left the trip with the bare essentials so as not to weigh down the 70 kg sled that she had to drag through the snow, namely through the sastrugis, small ice structures that the wind had formed slowed it down.
Her sled hit her every time she went up and down these “little hills in an endless labyrinth.”
“Once the wind reaches -30 degrees, it's torture. It often seemed to me that I had tears in my eyes, but also cried uncontrollably like a child.
As the creator of an “imaginary friend,” a husky dog she named “North” to avoid feeling too alone, the 37-year-old Montrealer faced a sea of fog in which she “no longer made a difference.” Sky and earth” and wondered if she would fall into the void.
Strangely, she felt claustrophobic and “had the impression that the white walls [allaient l]'crush and [la] to cut in pieces.
“When I was little, I imagined monsters and horror stories at night in Quebec, but here it's even worse,” she writes.
Caroline Côté during an expedition in northern Canada in 2022. Photo Vincent Colliard, provided by Caroline Côté
Thanks, Krazy Glue
Bring the essentials: food (see table below), little clothing – she only had pants, which is very bad news as she had her period without pads or tampons – a sleeping bag, a very thin ground sheet, a GPS, a Compass.
“It was a sporting endurance project. Because of the weight, I couldn't take a camera with me. “I didn’t have time to record videos because I had to be busy,” recalls the woman, who only took a short afternoon off.
Côté therefore only had one solar panel instead of the usual two to charge her satellite phone and cell phone (handy for listening to podcasts or Christmas carols for a Christmas fanatic). The panel broke but she managed to fix it. A ski binding failed, but the magic of Krazy Glue worked.
Adventure filmmaker Caroline Côté during an expedition in Nunavut. Photo Vincent Colliard, provided by Caroline Côté
In survival mode
After returning to civilization, Caroline Côté had to get used to dealing with people again.
“It is sustained exercise over 33 days. It is very demanding on the body, but also on the mind. We are in survival mode. We come out mentally exhausted,” she emphasizes.
“The physical fatigue goes away quickly when you eat, but the mind rebuilds itself and it takes a little longer. For example, it took me a month before I wanted to read. I kept falling asleep.”
When you are stunned in the middle of a crowd, good manners need to be restored quickly.
“You don’t have to blow your nose into a tissue!” the woman started training in advertising, cinema and communication.
Added to this is the sense of smell, which returns “because it disappears when it’s so cold.”
“I missed the smells of grilling, washing or just people. Even the garbage stinks!”
Bite into butter
As for food, the explorer enjoyed a salad, fresh fruit and vegetables. His first meal was a pumpkin dish in Punta Arenas, Chile, “with a glass of pisco sour, the local liquor.”
“It's worth all the gold in the world after a month of eating fat, chocolate and freeze-dried foods.” I even bit into some butter there, even though I don't like dairy! It's soft, warm and gave me strength. I also developed a love for chocolate, but unlike butter, it stayed at home.”
His home was an apartment in the Saint-Henri neighborhood of Montreal. Soon it will be Norway, with her husband. Soon he will embark on the same adventure as them, with the goal of breaking the men's record, which stands at 24 days.
Next, the couple wants to start a business guiding people in the mountains behind their home in Nordskot.
Caroline Côté is concerned about climate change and also wants to make a documentary about the culture of the Sami, an indigenous people living in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia and Ukraine.
GÉLETTE EDITIONS
Caroline Cote. Photo Marie-Ève Rompré, provided by Nathalie Roy
Adventure filmmaker Caroline Côté during an expedition to Nunavut in northern Canada in 2022. Photo Vincent Colliard, provided by Caroline Côté