Bear Grylls (55 page)

I called Chloë to tell her the good news that we had finally arrived in Nanortalik; then I called Captain Pennefather direct.

‘What was your fuel state when you arrived?’ he asked.

‘Vapour,’ I replied, smiling.

Indecision is the thief of opportunity.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Sleeping for a
couple of hours, taking a hot shower, getting something decent to eat: these are the kinds of thing most of us take for granted every day of our lives.
After 700 miles of living in an open boat on the Labrador Sea, exhausted and salt-burnt, these simple acts took on a meaning that is hard to describe.

The Inuit mayor showed us to our ‘hotel’, which was a relatively large corrugated building surrounded by several rows of smaller corrugated houses. But at that moment, a five-star
West End hotel could not have been more enticing.

We hung our soaking kit up to dry in the dusty boiler room, and Nige, Mick and I were asleep, fully clothed, before we had even closed the door of our small bedroom. The shower could wait a few
minutes longer.

We woke an hour or so later; it was mid-afternoon. Andy and Charlie were beginning to let their hair down and have a few beers with some of the locals. They had certainly earned a night off.

There was an Internet terminal in the hotel reception and I stayed behind with Mick to check the weather forecast on the increasingly familiar series of websites.

Our next leg was going to be the longest of the expedition, and probably the most challenging: just over 800 miles round Greenland, across the Denmark Strait and on to Reykjavik in Iceland. The
web pages took a while to download, and I watched them slowly unfold on the screen.

My heart sank as I read what appeared.

‘There will be a Force Three weather pattern for the next forty-eight hours . . . and severe storms are expected to arrive in the Denmark Strait by Friday afternoon.’

It was already Tuesday evening.

There was no problem with a Force Three weather pattern. That would be ideal. That was about as good as the weather was ever going to get in this part of the world. The real problem was that,
for the second time on the expedition, just like in St Mary’s, I was being presented with a dangerous dilemma, a fifty–fifty decision, a roll of the dice.

The choice was straightforward: either we seized the latter part of the forty-eight-hour weather window, banking on reaching Iceland before the main storms hit this far north, or we played safe
and waited in Nanortalik until conditions improved.

Was forty-eight hours long enough to reach Iceland? Maybe it was just, if we left now, but that was impossible. We couldn’t even refuel until 10 a.m. the following day. That reduced the
forty-eight-hour window to thirty-six hours. But what was the alternative? A wait that might not break until the ice-packs returned in earnest?

Yet again, I felt as though I was being challenged to gamble with our lives. And I hate gambling. It just takes one bad call to make it your last. Mick looked at me. Only a matter of hours ago
we had been pleading for land, dreaming of respite from the fury of the sea, and here we were debating whether we should put ourselves back into that furnace. It didn’t sit easy at all.

I leaned back in the chair and wished I could be in a situation where the forecast meant the decision was obvious, either way.

Mick wrote all the data down, to spell it out clearly.

The advantages of staying were that we would all get the few days of rest that we so desperately needed after our ordeal in the Labrador Sea. The drawback was that the bad weather could remain
in place for three to four weeks by the look of the weather patterns moving up from the south. That would mean we could be stuck in Greenland until September when winter would begin to draw in
again. The temperatures then drop even further, the ice starts to compact, and it would become impossible to complete the expedition.

‘Who dares wins,’ rolls off the tongue so easily. It is much harder to say when your life is in that dare.

No doubt the benefit of leaving Greenland as soon as possible, most probably the following morning, was that we would sustain the momentum of the expedition and, with a bit of luck, reach
Iceland before the predicted lows and rough weather really took hold. The danger was if these lows came early; no one wanted to find themselves in another, bigger storm.

An additional factor was that this time we would be racing towards the bad weather, trying to beat it to Iceland. On the Labrador we had been travelling through the storm, eventually away from
trouble. Now the front would be blowing into us, so if we hit it, there would be no respite until port. The longer we took, the worse it would get. We knew that.

The others were now well into the drinking. I could hear them next door in the bar. The tension of the Labrador was getting drowned away in time-honoured fashion.

The little voice at the back of my head was urging me not to be impatient, to be responsible and cautious. I didn’t mind waiting, I had always wanted to have some time in this remote,
beautiful part of the world, but we had a goal in mind, and instinct told me we had to seize this window of opportunity.

Once again, five lives seemed to rest in my hands. Why couldn’t this decision be simple? Mick presented me with the facts in black and white, on paper, in his scrawl that I knew so well.
Mike Town concurred. It was my call. But I couldn’t make it.

This was a massive decision, and I didn’t feel able to make it alone. In search of calm, wise advice, I called Captain Pennefather. He listened quietly as I explained the situation,
sketching out the pros and cons.

Willie didn’t say much because he didn’t need to. He just let me talk through the situation and, as I talked, I gradually began to realize there was really no choice at all. Yes, it
was exhausting, it was too soon in an ideal world, and it was maybe a shade risky, but if we were going to complete the expedition, we basically had little choice.

Willie simply, cleverly, gave me the space to reach my own conclusion.

We rang Mike Town once more. Again he confirmed that two big fronts were on their way from the south and that if we didn’t leave soon, we would probably have to remain in Greenland for
several weeks. Mick looked once more at the charts, estimating wave heights and our chances of reaching Iceland in the time that this weather window seemed to allow us.

I asked Mick for his honest view on what we should do, no holds barred. I knew it was important to be decisive with the other guys, but Mick was different; he was my closest mate. I could share
everything with him, without shame, my real fears and doubts, the sheer uncertainty of it all. I looked at him. His eyes looked tired. Tired of the salt water and now tired of the computer
screen.

‘So?’

He frowned, paused, then said quietly, ‘Bear, I guess we’ve got to leave in the morning.’ He continued, ‘Every minute will count. How early do you think we will be able
to get away?’

‘Well, if we refuel on time, we should be able to leave at around eleven thirty, at a push.’

This didn’t even give us time to dry our clothes.

‘Instinct is the nose of the mind . . . trust it.’ This was one of the quotes that we had laminated and stuck on the boat. ‘Bloody quotes,’ I swore. But it was our
answer.

Now I had to break the news to the others.

As I stood
outside the bar, grey clouds of doubt scudded in all over again. Was I putting my ambition to complete this expedition ahead of our lives? Was I being
impulsive and foolish?

I knew that 80 per cent of the time people die on high mountains because they push on when common sense says they should turn back. Was I doing just that? We had been let off the hook on the
Labrador Sea. How smart was it to go straight back out, into possibly even worse weather? But how would we know if we never even tried?

I called them together in a room alongside the bar. They were enjoying a few beers and were not really in the mood for a meeting. I would have felt exactly the same in their position. I felt a
strange pang of envy. I didn’t want this burden.

‘Well, there is good news and bad news,’ I began, realizing that none of them was expecting what they were about to hear. ‘The good news is that we have a window of good
weather, and the bad news is that, to take this opportunity, we must leave as soon as possible in the morning.’

They stood motionless. Nobody said a word.

‘It will mean we need to get up at five,’ I continued, filling the void, ‘and start prepping the boat. It’s not great, but it seems our only choice if we are ever to
reach Iceland.’

I paused.

‘And I’m really sorry we can’t delay the weather.’

Mick, at least, had been prepared. Andy, Nige and Charlie just looked understandably fed up. The long-awaited period of rest and recovery after the Labrador crossing was being cancelled. This, I
am certain, was the single most difficult moment of the entire expedition.

Mick outlined the reasons for the decision, explaining the weather forecast and how forty-eight, possibly seventy-two, hours of clear weather would be followed by weeks of storms, but Andy was
clearly hesitant and uncomfortable.

‘Bear, the one thing we all said when we arrived here was that, above all, we didn’t want to get caught in bad weather again,’ he reminded us. ‘We were bloody lucky out
there this time. Now you’re telling us to go back into it with a shit forecast, with little chance of beating that weather to Iceland. What happens if the fronts come sooner rather than
later?’

‘I know that’s the risk. I don’t have an answer for that,’ I replied. ‘I only have the facts. Study the charts Mick’s done and see what you reckon. If we
don’t all agree, we don’t go.’

This took Andy a few minutes to digest. And part of me, if I am honest, longed for someone to say no. The idea of another storm terrified me. Anyone who thinks these expeditions are romantic
should have felt the tension in that room. It was palpable. These decisions were critical. My hands were sweating.

‘Let’s try and get a few hours’ sleep now,’ I said.

The guys had arrived in high spirits; they returned to their rooms in silence. I was knackered, in mind and body, and as I fell into bed and gazed at the white patterned ceiling, I just hoped we
had made the correct decision.

Charlie recalls:

There are not many situations that don’t look better after a decent night’s sleep, and when we all woke at 5.30, everyone appeared more cheerful and purposeful. Everyone now accepted
the logic. We had agreed on the decision together, and the team was moving forward as one. Nobody was on the touchlines. We were all players and had made our own calls.

Mick and Andy started preparing the boat, which still looked a mess after the Labrador crossing; Charlie and Nige were doing their best to dry and repack all the equipment, and I settled the
hotel bill, arranged the refuelling and sorted out the customs forms. With luck, I reckoned, we would be able to get away before noon.

We all knew the blue sky above us would not last for ever and the forty-eight-hour clock was ticking.

The mayor had invited us to lunch, but I dropped by his home to say this was no longer possible. I explained that every minute counted in our race to cross the Denmark Strait and reach Iceland
before the storms arrived. He understood completely.

It was almost half past eleven when I reached the quayside. The guys had done a fantastic job, and we were almost ready to leave.

Alex Rayner, our PR man in London, had been asking us repeatedly to do a select few radio interviews. I knew that I should do these, but I felt uncomfortable. This just wasn’t the right
time. I reneged on my promise to Alex, turned off the SAT phone, and quietly hoped he would understand.

However, a minute later, a radio station got through on Nige’s mobile phone. It was BBC Radio Five Live.

‘Bear, we’ll call you back in twenty minutes for a live slot,’ said the producer in London. ‘Is that OK?’

The guys were waiting in the boat. We were refuelled and ready to go. They had met our deadline exactly. It was 11.30 a.m. precisely. They all looked at me.

I put the phone to my ear again. ‘I’m really sorry, but we just don’t have the time.’

‘Just twenty minutes?’

‘Not this time; we have to leave now. I’m really sorry.’

They were clearly a bit put out, but away in their London studio they were not to know that for us to wait another twenty minutes could turn out to be the difference between reaching Iceland
safely and getting trapped in the oncoming gales.

We didn’t have that sort of time to waste. I jumped aboard the boat and Andy turned the key once more. If all went to plan, this engine would run continuously until we reached Iceland. And
that was a long way from here. Iceland, in my little son Jesse’s
Children’s Atlas of the World
, was still one whole page away.