The oatcakes were also specially made and supplied by Sætre Kjæksfabrik, Oslo. In addition to the specified biscuit ration we should have taken with us, Director Knutsen gave us a box of “Fru Clausen’s cakes” for each machine. How grateful we were later for these! Not only were the cakes delicious, but they helped us to continue our long and tedious work, and augmented our rations in such a way that we were provisioned for some time longer, thereby postponing the possible need of our setting off on a march to Greenland, which we should have had to do had we failed to start the machine.
In addition to this, Amundsen’s good friend, Mr. Horlick, had sent us to Spitzbergen a supply of Horlick’s malted milk (malted milk in tablet form). When we felt a little weak we took ten of these tablets per man per day. The intention was that we should take one at a time at equal intervals during the day’s course. I began by taking one as I crept into my sleeping bag in the evening. In a few days I had got so used to these tablets that I had to get out of my sleeping bag to fetch another one. This course became burdensome, so I placed the box beside me. Soon I found that I had to take five or six of them before I could stop. They tasted like good sweetmeats, and the next step was to take the box into my sleeping bag with me because I found it too tiresome to crawl halfway in and out every time I wanted to reach a tablet. The result was that I could sleep peacefully for the rest of the night. At that time if one of us was on guard all night, he got an extra ration of ten malted milk tablets, and could make a warm drink with them which we called “a cup of tea” because it looked like tea with milk in it and because it had a similar taste. We placed an incalculable value on these tablets and felt how greatly they strengthened us.
Our full ration list comprised the following:
| Per Man | |
| Pemmican 400 grams per day. For 30 days | 12.00 kg. |
| Chocolate 2 tablets each 125 grams | 7.50 „ |
| Oatcakes 125 grams per day (12 cakes) | 3.75 „ |
| Molico dried milk 100 grams per day | 3.00 „ |
| Malted milk 125 grams per day | 3.75 „ |
| In all per man for 30 days | 30.00 kg. |
The list of our additional equipment per man:
Rucksack, which held a change of underclothes (comprising woolen vests, drawers, pair of stockings, a pair of goat’s-hair socks). Matches in a waterproof bag. Automatic lighter. Housewife. A cup and a spoon. One can. Tobacco. Pipe. Diary. Telescope and all small personal belongings.
- In footwear we had ski boots and a pair of boots of our own selection.
- One pair of skis, two staves, one set of reins.
- Every man should have a clasp knife.
List of “Mutual Belongings for Flying Boat Equipment”
- One canvas boat.
- One sledge.
- One medicine chest.
- One tent.
- Reserve ski straps.
- Reserve pig-skin reins for sledges.
- One Primus with cooking vessel (large).
- One box, reserve screws, etc., for Primus.
- Thirty liters petroleum.
- Meta cooking vessel with case of plates.
- One kilogram Dubbin.
- Sail-cloth gloves, syringes, large nails and sail thread.
- One sextant.
- One pocket sextant (for sledge journey).
- One spirit level.
- One chart ruler.
- Navigation tables.
- One log-book.
- Pair of compasses.
- Two T squares.
- Pencils.
- Binoculars.
- Six large and four small smoke-bombs.
- Smoke-bomb pistol.
- One leeway measure.
- One solar compass.
- One shot gun with 200 cartridges.
- One rifle with 200 cartridges.
- One Colt pistol with fifty cartridges.
- One electric pocket lamp.
- Motor reserve parts.
- Motor tools.
- One ax.
- One snow shovel.
- One rucksack.
- Ropes.
- One ice anchor.
- One reserve ski pole.
- One petrol bucket.
- One petrol funnel.
- One oil funnel.
- One kilogram aniline.
- One half sack senna grass.
- Ski Dubbin.
- Three pilot balloons.
- Three pairs of snow-shoes.
On account of weight we were debarred from taking any reserve ski equipment with us. In the event of our requiring new ski parts before the end of a march, the sledges were arranged with a lower part like skis, which could be detached and rigged out as skis with reserve strappings. The idea was that towards the end of such a march everything could, in the event of trouble, be put onto one sledge, leaving the other free for us to dismantle and use. Should any misfortune occur at the beginning of the journey, we would be in a much worse position. For such an eventuality we took snow-shoes with us.