With ski & sledge over Arctic glaciers

by Sir William Martin Conway

Since Nansen published his book, “The First Crossing of Greenland,” the English public has known of ski and their use. Ski (pronounced shee) are Norwegian snowshoes, now admitted to be the best form of snowshoe in the world. They are long, narrow planks for fastening one under each foot, so as to distribute over an area of soft snow, many times larger than the area of the foot, the weight of a man walking. They not only prevent him from sinking into the snow, but, if it is in suitable condition, they enable him to slide along on its surface. The common idea in England is that the art of using ski is very difficult of acquisition. This, as I shall show, is a mistake. No doubt the almost miraculous expertness attained by the best Norwegian and Swedish skisters (to coin a needed word) is beyond reach of ordinary Englishmen, who take to the sport when they are full grown and have rare opportunities for practising it. But for purposes of mere travel far less skill is required.

In fact, it is with skiing as it is with skating. Any person, with normal habits of exercise and control over his limbs, can learn to skate in a few days well enough to go straight ahead over good ice at a tolerable pace. Within a fortnight of his putting on skates for the first time, he might go a-touring along frozen Dutch canals without being much, if anything, of a hindrance to a companion, the most expert of figure-skaters. To pass the St. Moritz test as a figure-skater takes months or even years of practice, but that is to learn the art, not the mere craft of skating. So it is with skiing. The artist skister can race down steep slopes at an appalling velocity, leaping drops or crefts of almost incredible dimensions. A traveller who needs ski for the purpose of exploring the great snowy areas of the world has no occasion to acquire skill of that pre-eminent character. He is not called upon to advance faster than a sledge can be dragged by men or dogs, as the case may be, and that he can learn to accomplish in a very short time. Sliding downhill is a little more difficult; but any climber, who can make standing glissades with facility, soon learns to glissade on ski down any ordinary slope of snow.

When Garwood and I landed in Norway last year, we had never seen a pair of ski, and did not know where to buy or how to choose them. During the summer we travelled over 150 miles on ski, dragging our sledges behind us. Later on we went to Stockholm and saw all manner of ski in the Exhibition there, and availed ourselves of every opportunity that came in our way to obtain information about ski and everything connected with them. We soon learnt that there are ski of all sorts and kinds. They differ in the material of which they are made, and they differ in form. I am told that ash is the best material to make them of. The points to be seen to are the straightness of the grain and the absence of knots. Lightness is less important for a traveller than strength.

The questions of form and size are determined by the purpose for which the ski are to be used. Speaking generally, narrow ski are faster than broad of the same area. In soft snow, however, the advantage vanishes, for narrow ski sink in more deeply than broad; indeed, for very soft snow, ski require to be both broad and long. The edges and the hinder ends may be either rounded or cut off square. For hill climbing it is certain that the squarer the angle of section of edges and hinder ends the better, seeing they take a better hold of the snow, and prevent sliding sideways or backwards; sharp edges also make steering easier on hard snow. Relatively short, broad ski, are best for hill climbing, and, in general, for the work of a traveller. They are easier to advance on, easier to steer, and easier to turn round with. Their length may be anything from two to one and a half metres, two metres for choice; they should measure eight centimetres at the narrowest part under the foot, increasing forward to from nine to ten centimetres at the broadest part, just where the toe of the ski begins to turn up. The front ends should be well turned up, the points being raised from twelve to fifteen centimetres above the level of a horizontal plane on which the ski stand. Such ski are of the Telemark type, and can be bought under the name “Telemark ski,” from the Scandinavian manufacturers. A good pair, made of selected ash, costs about fifteen shillings.

The most important matter for a novice is to learn how best to attach his ski to his feet. There are various ways in which this can be done. In all alike the attachment is such that the foot can be freely bent and the heel raised, while the fore part of the foot is kept firmly in contact with the ski. The roughest attachment is a mere loop or strap of leather, fastened to the two sides of the ski, and gripping the front part of the foot. This, however, permits the foot to wobble, a most disagreeable condition for a beginner. Such fastenings were all that Nielsen and Svensen used, and they seemed quite comfortable with them. The common binding, and the best for a traveller, is more complicated. The broad strap, going over the fore part of the foot, is divided longitudinally on each side about the level of the sole. Through the two loops thus formed there passes a stout piece of cane covered with leather, the middle of which goes round the back of the foot near the heel, whilst the two ends are brought forward and drawn together in front of the toe, where they are fastened down firmly to the wood of the ski. This fastening has to be adjustable, so that the cane loop may be drawn close against the heel. There are several sorts of adjustment; one is shown in the illustration. Another, perhaps better, is a kind of vice that opens and shuts by a screw; it grips the two ends well and enables either of them to be pushed forward ahead of the other. A small strap, sewn on to the back of the boot, low down, holds the cane in place. The same result may be less well attained by using an additional strap that passes both under and above the instep, and is sewn on both sides to the leather covering of the cane. This form of attachment is usually employed by winter skisters in the Alps. For advancing over level ground, all the fastenings may be loose; but for hill climbing they need to be tight, so that the feet are firmly attached to the ski and can direct them with certainty. Beginners will certainly find tightly-attached ski much easier than loose to walk or glissade on.

The next question is that of footgear. For moderate cold, such as you meet with in summer in the arctic regions, ordinary climbing boots do well enough; but leather Lapp shoes are better. These seem to be known by different names. I find them called “pjäxa-schuhe” in a Swedish-German catalogue, which mentions two qualities, Norrbotten (price 8s. 6d.), and Norwegian (price 14s. 6d.). A particular kind of band is made, called a pjäxband, a kind of putti, for winding round the top of the boot to keep out snow.

Within these leather boots thick goathair stockings should be worn. So far as I know, they can only be purchased in Norway and Sweden, the price varying according to the length. For very great cold, such as that of arctic winter, shoes of reindeer fur, stuffed out with hay, are required. The adjustment of ski to these is a less simple matter, for if the hay is badly packed the cane is likely to rub against the heel and produce a painful raw.

One more part of the equipment for skiing has yet to be mentioned. It is the staff. Racing skisters use two sticks, one in each hand, but for glissading the two have to be held together like a single staff. To facilitate this, there are specially constructed staves made to fit together. The ordinary ski-staff is provided with a kind of plate near the spike, to prevent the point penetrating too far into soft snow, and to give resistance for a push off. Travellers using ski in mountain regions will probably find it best to carry an ordinary ice-axe and make shift with it. An axe is far less convenient than a longer bamboo staff, for mere purposes of skiing, but its other uses, when ski are laid aside on steepening slopes where real climbing is required, overbalance its obvious defects. It would be easy to devise some form of small, circular plate to slip over the point of the axe a little way up the stick, and wedge there, quickly removable when the axe is required for step-cutting.