Long enough, smooth enough.

What are the chances of getting down?

I'd say they're pretty good.

By the pole?

Yeah, we'll probably land within at least, probably right at the pole.

Okay, let's do it.

We'll see what we can do.

The first problem is where to plant your pole.

The North Pole is on a constantly moving sea of ice, so where the pole is now may not be where the pole is in an hour's time.

That's why, as the Americans might say, once you've got it, flaunt it.

This is it.

I'm standing on the top of the world, at the North Pole, where the time is, well, the time's anything you want it to be up here.

The temperature's about minus 25 degrees centigrade, so there's no point in hanging around.

What I'm going to do is make a journey from here to the South Pole, which is in every direction.

If I went that way, I'd go down through Japan.

If I went that way, I'd go down through India.

But we've chosen a route that way, 30 degrees east, line of longitude, down through Russia and Africa.

It's going to be a hell of a long journey, but, well, let's go.

I hadn't expected things to be such a rush.

The pilot won't risk turning his engines off in the bitter cold.

Though I'd quite like to sit and write a few postcards, he wants to be off while we still have enough fuel left.

And you don't argue with the pilot. Not at the North Pole.

The plane we're in was designed in the 1950s.

Our lives depend on it.

There are no airstrips, no control towers, no emergency vehicles below us.

There is rapidly changing weather, intense cold and hundreds of miles of frozen ocean.

And this is just the beginning.

We've chosen the 30-degree east line of longitude simply because it covers the most land, running through Scandinavia and the great cities of St Petersburg,

Istanbul and Cairo.

We'll be travelling down the River Nile, across the desert to Khartoum and on to Lake Tanganyika and Cape Town, from one extreme of the earth to the other.

Even if everything works, we have almost half a year's travelling ahead of us.

After 13 hours flying over the Arctic Ocean, the sight of the tiny settlement of Nielsen on the island of Spitsbergen is an indescribable relief.

Many Arctic expeditions began here and some, including Amundsen's last flight, never returned.

We ourselves touch down with only minutes' worth of fuel left.

We may not quite have run out of fuel, but we have run out of good weather.

There's nothing to do but wait, and waiting, they tell me, is what the Arctic is all about.

It's two days before the blizzards let up.

We've made it an unwritten rule of the journey not to use air transport where there's any possible alternative, and the only alternative out of Nielsen is by the modern equivalent of dogs and sledges, snowmobiles and sledges.

It's an unusual journey, and, as one of our Norwegian guides explains, it's a journey that's not just about the weather,

It's an unusual journey, and, as one of our Norwegian guides explains, it demands unusual precautions.

We have to carry guns just in case polar bears are too hungry to leave us alone.

How many polar bears are there on these islands?

Approximately 6,000, 7,000.

That's the last estimate I heard.

If we don't get to a hut or to safety of any kind and we have to stop on the glacier, do you have emergency rations and tents and things?

Yes, nothing elaborate, but just enough to keep us alive for two or three days.

There are no passengers on this journey.

We shall all have to master the art of snowmobile driving, even me.

Oh, here he comes.

The Arctic is littered with weather stations which can tell you how big the ozone hole will be in five years, but strangely little about what's going to happen in the next five hours.

At the first pass, the snow sweeps in again, and suddenly you can't see a thing.

The boys' own fun of snowmobile driving becomes something much more serious.

Mind you, there are times when I'd almost prefer not to see where I'm going.

Conditions change so quickly that it's absolutely essential never to lose sight of the vehicle in front.

Sometimes, I admit, my concentration wavers.

I blame Spitsbergen.

It is stunningly beautiful.

The Arctic

We drive on through the night, though at this time of year the sun never sets.

It's still there at three in the morning, and at last we glimpse the first sign of human habitation since leaving Nielsen.

It's a trapper's hut, standing on the shores of a frozen fjord.

The garden furniture's a bit grim.

A rack full of dead seals, meat for the trapper's dogs.

It is, thanks to the owner's generosity, our hotel for the night.

Outside bathroom, of course.

It's a bit cold.

Our host, Harald Solheim, looks more like a rabbi than a trapper, and he's lived here on his own for 15 years.

It's a very lonely life here, Harald, isn't it?

Why do you choose a life like this?

In the beginning, it was some sort of adventure about the whole thing, but it's not that anymore.

It's just a way of living.

The idea of a trapper now is very unfashionable.

Environmentally, the idea of people hunting and killing animals is now much criticised.

How do you react to that?

It's OK if they are vegetarians, then they could blame the hunters.

That I could understand, but people that are going into shops and buying meat...

As far as I know, every meat comes from living animals, and you have to kill them before you eat them.

If you were a vegetarian, how would you survive here?

Very badly, I'm afraid.

You seem to have most comforts here, but is there anything, any one thing that you miss?

Sometimes one could miss different things, and especially it could be pleasant to have some women companions sometimes.

You are an ordinary man and you feel some needs, no and none, but I think I would prefer to stay alone.

As our revving engines rudely shatter the tranquillity of an arctic morning,

I can see his point.

We wave our goodbyes and hurtle on our way south to goodness knows what problems and crises, leaving Harold Solheim's remote kingdom surrounded once again by the certainty and comfort of silence.

Three quarters of Spitsbergen is permanently covered with ice.

There are no trees on the island.

The port of Longyearbyen, which we reach after two days travelling, is still 600 miles from mainland Europe.

It's frozen in for most of the year.

Even now, in early summer, there's only one ship strong enough to take us safely through the ice, the MV Norsal.

She made it.

She's got a long way to go.

She may not look the part of an arctic rambo, but she knows these waters well.

She's been a scallop fisher and a seal catcher, and now, as a supply vessel, she's become an arctic lifeline.

Progress through the ice is painfully slow, and looking at the inflatable globe, which has already been round the world with me,

I can see we're hardly clear of the bit where you blow it up.

There isn't much to do on the Norsal, except walking and skating, which is a bit of leisure nevertheless.

The Norsal is a very quiet coastal island, rather concluding in the tides.

Accommodating a sizeable population, there isn't much to do on the Norsal, except walking and skating, which tend to be the same thing anyway.

There's iceberg spotting, but I haven't got my book with me, so it's more Arctic waiting.

On our third day at sea, the pack ice at last begins to clear.

Surging to our full speed of ten knots, we set course for the heart of the Barents Sea.

Captain Bjørgelud can at last set about the work he's here for.

They call the Barents Sea the Devil's Dance Floor, and my stomach is doing a few early steps as we reach the fishing grounds.

The Norwegian Coast Guard is out in force.

Is that an aeroplane out there?

Yeah, that's the Orion.

That's the Norwegian Coast Guard, that too.

What's happening? There's some big event out here.

Ships and...

No, it's looking for...

It's controlling the fishing fleet and giving information to the Coast Guard vessel.

And it's also observing if there is any orderly activity, and if there is any orderly activity, and if there is any orderly activity, and if there is any oil spill on the sea.

For environmental reasons.

She's coming very low, though.

I've never seen her so low before.

The Norsel has a contract to refuel more than a dozen ships, the largest of which is the Jan Mayen.

She's a state-of-the-art factory fishing vessel, and it's part of her facilities that I've been invited on board to watch her work.

My transfer is a complicated procedure involving a survival suit, a lynching party and a general loss of dignity.

You're supposed to save my life.

I've got you to the sea.

All the time.

Shall I just jump?

No, don't be afraid.

Afraid means I'm almost here.

Oh, here we go.

Ooh, barren sea, here I come.

Whoo-hoo-hoo!

Television presenters, Britain's newest export.

It's snowing again as the Jan Mayen begins to pull in her nets.

At first glance, the catch appears to consist entirely of citrus fruit.

A crew of 40, who spend two to three months at a time out in these inhospitable waters, is waiting to process the catch

The ship has a factory below decks capable of getting the goods from net to freeze pack in a couple of hours.

After all the build-up, the end result of five hours trawling looks like a half-empty Christmas stocking.

No mighty denizens of the deep in here.

Mostly shrimps.

Three tonnes of them.

Of an uncomfortable feeling, that's all there is left down there.

The ship is ready to go.

It's time to go.

It's time to go.

That's all there is left down there.

It's not a pretty sight, and I'm quite relieved when the school outing's over and the Norsel comes back to collect us.

With the last refuelling completed, we head south and life on board resumes its familiar pattern of major events.

Doing the washing.

Boiling the free shrimps we've been given for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

On the seventh day out of Spitsbergen, we reach the craggy snow-capped rim of northern Norway.

Maybe it's just because the sun's come out to welcome us that I feel the onset of what my children would call one of Dad's happy attacks.

What I call sheer relief that a little bit of the worst is safely over.

Sunday morning in Tromsø, the world's most northerly city.

It nestles in the shelter of the mountains, neat as Legoland.

The striking design of its arctic cathedral reflects prosperity and careful taste.

Modern, but not too modern.

But behind the facade of respectable conformity lies the proud and unpredictable spirit of Tromsø's maritime traditions.

Once thanks have been given, pleasure is taken.

They even call the city the Paris of the North.

I repair to the nearest boulevard cafe.

This is brewed here, is it?

Yes.

This is the famous... What's it called?

Muck.

Muck. It's called muck.

That's the way it's pronounced. It's actually spelt mack, isn't it?

It looks very nice. Is it so strong?

It's the best.

It's very clean water in it. It's very clean water.

That's why it's so famous.

We make it from very clean water.

Arctic water, is it?

Yes, that's right.

From ice cubes.

I mean, it's fine you say it's a very sunny city.

It's sunny at the moment, but then I know that the sun disappears totally for part of the year.

When does it go?

The sun leaves us 21st of November and comes back 21st of January.

That must have an effect, doesn't it?

It sort of confuses you.

I mean, how do you know when it's 3 o'clock in the afternoon or 3 o'clock in the morning?

You look at the watch.

Yeah.

It's all right if you have one of those clever watches that says 1500.

You look at people, they're drunk, it's 3 o'clock in the night.

Emboldened by muck, I visit a hero with whom I now have something in common.

There can't be many who have left Tromsø for the South Pole.

But Amundsen and I are not alone for long.

Visiting supporters.

Big football match tonight.

Trondheim v Tromsø.

These people have now got to try and remain sober for the next eight hours before they go to the stadium.

So, seems unlikely.

What is this?

This is Trondheim supporters beer.

Is this alcohol free?

You can try.

Is this low alcohol?

No.

It's a...

You've got a strong hand on it.

So, tonight is a big game?

Oh, yes, sir.

I think so.