By the evening of February 21 we were again ready to start. The sledges — seven in number — stood ready packed, and were quite imposing in appearance. Tempted by the favourable outcome of our former trip, we put too much on our sledges this time — on some of them, in any case. Mine was overloaded. I had to suffer for it afterwards — or, rather, my noble animals did.
On February 22, at 8.30 a.m., the caravan moved off — eight men, seven sledges, and forty-two dogs — and the most toilsome part of our whole expedition began. As usual, we began well from Framheim. Lindstrom, who was to stay at home alone and look after things, did not stand and wave farewells to us. Beaming with joy, he made for the hut as soon as the last sledge was in motion. He was visibly relieved. But I knew very well that before long he would begin to take little turns outside to watch the ridge. Would they soon be coming?
There was a light breeze from the south, dead against us, and the sky was overcast. Newly fallen snow made the going heavy, and the dogs had hard work with their loads. Our former tracks were no longer visible, but we were lucky enough to find the first flag, which stood eleven miles inland. From there we followed the dried fish, which stood out sharply against the white snow and were very easy to see. We pitched our camp at six o'clock in the evening, having come a distance of seventeen miles. Our camp was quite imposing — four tents for three men apiece, with two in each. In two of them the housekeeping arrangements were carried on. The weather had improved during the afternoon, and by evening we had the most brilliantly clear sky.
Next day the going was even heavier, and the dogs were severely tried. W e did no more than twelve and a half miles after eight hours' march. The temperature remained reasonable, +5deg. F. We had lost our dried fish, and for the last few hours were going only by compass.
February 24 began badly — a strong wind from the south-east, with thick driving snow. We could see nothing, and had to steer our course by compass. It was bitter going against the wind, although the temperature was no worse than -0.4deg. F. We went all day without seeing any mark. The snow stopped falling about noon, and at three o'clock it cleared. As we were looking about for a place to pitch the tents, we caught sight of one of our flags. When we reached it, we found it was flag No. 5 — all our bamboos were numbered, so we knew the exact position of the flag. No. 5 was forty-four and a half miles from Framheim. This agreed well with the distance recorded — forty-four miles.
The next day was calm and clear, and the temperature began to descend, -13deg. F. But in spite of this lower temperature the air felt considerably milder, as it was quite still. We followed marks and fish the whole way, and at the end of our day's journey we had covered eighteen miles — a good distance for heavy going.
We then had a couple of days of bitter cold with fog, so that we did not see much of our surroundings. We followed the fish and the marks most of the way. We had already begun to find the fish useful as extra food; the dogs took it greedily. The forerunner had to take up each fish and throw it on one side; then one of the drivers went out, took it up, and put it on his sledge. If the dogs had come upon the fish standing in the snow we should soon have had fierce fights. Even now, before we reached the depot in 80deg. S., the dogs began to show signs of exhaustion, probably as a result of the cold weather (-16.6deg. F.) and the hard work. They were stiff in the legs in the morning and difficult to set going.
On February 27, at 10.30 a.m., we reached the depot in 80deg. S. The depot was standing as we had left it, and no snow-drifts had formed about it, from which we concluded that the weather conditions had been quiet. The snow, which we had found very loose when we were there before, was now hardened by the cold. We were lucky with the sun, and got the position of the depot accurately determined.
On our way across these endless plains, where no landmarks of any kind are to be found, we had repeatedly thought of a means of marking our depots so that we might be perfectly sure of finding them again. Our fight for the Pole was entirely dependent on this autumn work, in laying down large supplies of provisions as far to the south as possible in such a way that we could be certain of finding them again. If we missed them, the battle would probably be lost. As I have said, we had discussed the question thoroughly, and come to the conclusion that we should have to try to mark our depots at right angles to the route, in an east and west direction, instead of in a line with the route, north and south. These marks along the line of the route may easily be missed in fog, if they are not close enough together; and if one thus gets out of the line, there is a danger of not picking it up again. According to this new arrangement we therefore marked this depot in 80deg. S. with high bamboo poles carrying black flags. We used twenty of these — ten on each side of the depot. Between each two flags there was a distance of 984 yards (900 metres), so that the distance marked on each side of the depot was five and a half miles (nine kilometres). Each bamboo was marked with a number, so that we should always be able to tell from this number on which side the depot lay, and how far off. This method was entirely new and untried, but proved afterwards to work with absolute certainty. Our compasses and sledge-meters had, of course, been carefully adjusted at the station, and we knew that we could rely on them.
Having put this in order, we continued our journey on the following day. The temperature fell steadily as we went inland; if it continued in this way it would be cold before one got to the Pole. The surface remained as before — flat and even. We ourselves had a feeling that we were ascending, but, as the future will show, this was only imagination. We had had no trouble with fissures, and it almost looked as if we should avoid them altogether, since, of course, it might be supposed that the part of the Barrier nearest the edge would be the most fissured, and we had already left that behind us. South of 80deg. we found the going easier, but the dogs were now beginning to be stiff and sore-footed, and it was hard work to get them started in the morning. The sore feet I am speaking of here are not nearly so bad as those the dogs are liable to on the sea-ice of the Arctic regions. What caused sore feet on this journey was the stretches of snow-crust we had to cross; it was not strong enough to bear the dogs, and they broke through and cut their paws. Sore feet were also caused by the snow caking and sticking between the toes. But the dog that has to travel on sea-ice in spring and summer is exposed to worse things — the sharp ice cuts the paws and the salt gets in. To prevent this kind of sore feet one is almost obliged to put socks on the dogs. With the kind of foot-trouble our dogs experienced it is not necessary to take any such precautions. As a result of the long sea voyage their feet had become unusually tender and could not stand much. On our spring journey we noticed no sore-footedness, in spite of the conditions being worse rather than better; probably their feet had got into condition in the course of the winter.