Felicity Aston is the first woman in the world to ski across Antarctica alone. Her latest book, ‘Chasing Winter: A Journey to the Pole of Cold’ provides stories and images from her most recent expedition, a 36,000km drive to the coldest inhabited place in the world. Fortunately, we only needed to make it as far as the air conditioned halls of London’s Olympia to talk to her about technology and Australian travel.

What are your feelings about technology? Do you love it, loathe it or feel excited by the possibilities it presents?
Just because the technology is out there doesn’t mean I HAVE to use it – I only use the technology that suits my purposes and makes my life easier. For example blogging from my tent each evening using a very slow satellite connection could be detrimental to an expedition but sending SMS messages from a satphone which appear as Tweets was a really easy and effective way to keep people in touch with the expedition and make them feel like they were along with us.

I think it’s amazing that I can communicate from the Poles in real time – I once gave a lecture in central London, live from my tent near the South Pole! In the old days explorers would disappear for years and everyone would have to wait till they returned to find out what they were doing. Now we have the tools to think of new ways of sharing the expedition experience. I think our imagination and innovation sometimes moves slower than the technological advances!

Do you use technology when you head off on an adventure, or is it merely a useful tool when planning?
The biggest difference between polar exploration 100 years ago and today is satellite technology. I use satellites to navigate and communicate. It means that a palm-sized GPS unit can give me an immediate spot location – and if I get into trouble, a satellite phone means that others are alerted immediately. Carrying a satphone on an Antarctic expedition is now a compulsory condition of being insured, so it is intrinsic to modern polar travel.

What items of technology do you use?
Extreme cold isn’t very forgiving on electronics so usually the more basic the tech the better. I use Iridium satellite phones which are built to be robust – but it does mean that there are less of the knobs and whistles we’ve come to expect on regular smart phones – no graphic displays for example, but then, that isn’t important in a tent in the Antarctic!

Felicity Aston First Woman To Ski Antarctic Solo

On all my expeditions I have used flexible solar panels to charge phone and camera batteries. There is 24-hour daylight in the polar regions during the summer, so laying out solar panels over the tent while we sleep is a good way to get everything charged up.

What are the drawbacks of travel technology?
Batteries. Even with handheld GPS units, the batteries run down very quickly in the cold. This means I have to restrict use and fall back on a traditional compass whenever possible. On ski expeditions, when you are dragging everything with you in sledges, weight is very important and batteries are heavy!

Is there some item on your wish list that manufacturers haven’t created yet?
Yes, a video camera that automatically edits footage into short movie clips, puts them to music and uploads them to the internet – there are moves in this direction, so hopefully I shouldn’t have to wait too long!

We’re an Australian travel site, so tell us about the items on your Australian bucket list (ours would be a trip on the Ghan).
Funny you mentioned the Ghan, I would LOVE to do that. Also:

  • 4×4 driving in the outback in central Australia to explore remote areas
  • Diving in the Whitsunday Islands
  • Hiking on Tasmania

You can find more about Felicity at www.felicityaston.com. And to find out more about the Ghan and Australian travel in general, have a read of our Australian destinations pages.

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