Endurance Part IV: Ch 1-5

     At this point in the book, all three boats and the former crew of the Endurance are fighting to stay alive while navigating their way through treacherous ice, looking for land. Twice they try to make camp only to have the floes break apart on them and sending them once again out into the sea. The men are cold and the majority of them are frostbitten from trying to row the boats to safety. They have been without drinkable water or ice for over five days and their thirst is leading to sea-sickness. When they are within just a few miles of shore, a strong current has them fighting just to stay in their current position. Thinking it will raise their chances of getting ashore, one boat breaks off from the other two during the night. Finally, after six days of being in the boats and 497 days of being at sea, all three boats and all 28 men landed on what they assumed to be Clarence Island.

     The term irony is used many times in this part of the book when the men realize that the water rushing into their boats was actually warmer than the air and therefore more comfortable to sit in. Also, after the boats were separated, one was afraid the other two had not made it. As they were searching for a place to tie up along the coast, they spotted the other two boats and thought it ironic that the only reason they had been reunited was because there was no safe place to land:

"By some incredible coincidence, the Docker's inability to find a suitable place to land had reunited her with the rest of the party. Had there been a haven somewhere in those 14 miles behind her, the two groups might now have been miles apart, each assuming the other had been lost."

     I can no longer fathom at all what these men must have been feeling and experiencing at this part of the journey. So far, nothing has gone according to plan and they were all on the brink of death. I believe it was a miracle that they have lasted this long and I respect and honor the strength and determination it must have taken to survive.