For five months, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men, drifting on ice packs, were castaways in one of the most savage regions of the world. The book, as the expedition, is a sobering, frightening story of unrelenting suffering, challenges on a super-human scale, seemingly unrelenting and insurmountable obstacles, overwhelming odds against survival; but ultimately it’s very much truly inspirational story of hope, of never giving up. If you don't know much about Shackleton's expedition, this is the book that elevated Shackleton's reputation above that of Robert Scott and made him a British national hero.

The men there are in shock and utter awe at the strength and determination of Shackleton and his men.They didn't even make it past the Antarctic circle before they were confronted by an impasse of ice floes. One man experienced a heart attack while another underwent primitive surgery to amputate toes afflicted with gangrene. Alfred Lansing wrote this book from the journals the men kept, which gave him a very detailed picture of every stage of this journey. This was the beginning of a struggle for survival, with 28 men with three small boats striking out by sledge and boat across the hazardous Weddel Sea for Elephant Island. i expect this situation is on account of where i live and all, but surely there has to be one polar-explorer type wandering through queens, looking for a lady to tell his tales of adventure to!

Después de una selección de personal un tanto sorprendente, a ojo, este si, este no, el Endurance partió de Plymouth con rumbo Buenos Aires cinco días después de que Gran Bretaña declarase la guerra a Alemania (primera guerra mundial) con 28 tripulantes (+ un polizón) a bordo. I cried as I read the last page, not so much because of the ending, but just because I was finished with the book. But most of the crew's experience ranged from blisters that froze solid (feeling like ice pebbles embedded under their skin) to nicotine withdrawal (one man was more upset by his lost tobacco than his near-drowning) to malnourishment. Their ship, The Endurance, was trapped and crushed by pack ice in the Weddell Sea, forcing the men to abandon ship.

This didn't go well and finally, after many hardships, it was up to Shackleton to attempt the rescue of 22 of his men stranded on a barren island locked in by ice. I used to be OK with letting such stuff go as a "conversation starter" but I now think such fuzziness is too dangerous. Once he realised there was no chance of rescue, he and four crew mates sailed a further 600 miles across the southern ocean to South Georgia where they were shipwrecked. I am relieved that I didn't even know about this utterly harrowing tale of man's survival prior to my visit to Antarctica. I would marvel at the amount of wildlife they encountered, the inexplicably hot and icy summers of the land, the joys of hard work that effectively stops you from spiraling into deep depression, and of course Shackleton's increasingly crazy yet effective survival plans being played out.

This was a gripping tale, made all the more poignant because it is true, and a well-narrated treat on audible. The South Pole had previously been discovered, but Shackleton hoped to lead an expedition from sea to sea. It's been pieced together from first hand accounts handed down through interviews with members of the crew and from diary entries (some of the crew kept diaries throughout the ordeal).As framework for the read, the Endurance is the ship Ernest Shackleton and the 27 crew members making up the Imperial Trans-Antarctica Expedition set sail on in 1914. Does the arsonist fireman deserve a medal for rescuing children from the apartment-building he set on fire? I believe this enabled the author to put forth an in-depth and intimate account of this most incredible and perilous voyage, which lasted almost two years.