Pen Hadow

We have something exciting to share with you this week…🌊🎥 Today is the Autumn Equinox, the moment the sun sets below the horizon at the North Pole for the last time until Spring 2026! It’s also 1 year today, that we made our journey to the Shetland Islands, and attempted to reach the northernmost rock of the UK! …’Why?’ you might ask? Well, tune in this week to watch the brand new trailer of documentary film ‘Out Stack!’, learn more on just how close to the Arctic the UK really is, and what this all means for the conservation of its biodiversity. ‘Out Stack!’ A documentary by Director @_michellesanders and Polar Explorer @penhadow …as you’ve never seen him before. . #equinox #autumequinox #northpole #conservation #explorer #shetlandislands #OutStack! #outstackfilm #biodiversity . Photo 1 @_michellesanders Photos 2-5 @sophiebolesworth

Dr Graeme Chesters and I on the shore of Windermere (Lake District) having a lunchtime break before more planning meetings for @90northfoundation Later we swam across the lake and back - delightfully refreshing!

A short break next to Windermere (Lake District) during 2-days of planning meetings for the years ahead @90northfoundation

Friends of @90northfoundation were astronauts in the Fram2 space mission this Spring - the first to orbit Earth via its North and South Poles. They sent back this image, taken from their space capsule, of the island of Spitsbergen (with Barents Island and Edge Island visible off its east coast), all located within the high Arctic archipelago of Svalbard in the Arctic Ocean, just 800 miles from the North Pole. 📸 @jannickemikkelsen #Protect90North

Hi Guys, I’m back in the game! 👋 Instagram that is. Here’s my favourite image from the UN Ocean Conference @unoceandecade in Nice (France) last week. It shows how we have only one global ocean (they’re all connected) and only one polar ocean region - the Central Arctic Ocean. Image credit: Athelstan Spilhaus (interpreted with this visualisation by NASA’s Visualization Studio). #UNOC3 #OceanDecade #Protect90North @90northfoundation

Last night we welcomed polar explorer and conservationist @penhadow to speak at our flagship store 214 Piccadilly. There are plenty of people who make vast claims about their polar accomplishments and due to his humility, the significance of Pen’s contributions has flown somewhat under the radar. He is the only person to have trekked solo, and without resupply by third parties, from Canada to the Geographic North Pole. He is the first Briton to have trekked, without resupply by third parties, to both the North and South Geographic Poles from the respective continental coastlines of North America and Antarctica. AND he led the Catlin Arctic Survey which investigated sea ice volume, ocean acidification and ocean circulation. Those are just a few in his long list of achievements. Safe to say, Pen is an incredible individual who has done something that has never nor will ever be repeated.. For all that and more, including his campaign to create a Marine Protected Area around the Central Arctic Ocean with the @90northfoundation Pen was awarded the Shackleton Medal for the Protection of the Polar Regions in 2023. It was an honour to host him, here are just a few highlights from the evening: “You’ve got to be on fire in your head. Just being positive is not going to be enough, because the stuff you’re gonna have to deal with in your head, that’s not that’s not going to get you through. You have got to be hell bent, to get through some of the pressures that you deal with and I was.” “I’ve never hit a polar bear with a bullet. I have hit it with a saucepan. Don’t get any closer than that, ladies and gentlemen, because it’s seriously, seriously frightening. They’re very big. They’re the largest, carnivores on the surface of the planet.” “I also want to plant a flag here that I organised the first all-women expedition to the North Pole. It was led by two Canadian women guides, and there were 20 British women. That was in 1997. I really was passionate that it’s ridiculous, that it’s just hairy blokes going up there, coming back looking butchered. I just thought we need to get away from this.” 📷: @martinrhartley @ameliabug #Shackleton #LiveCourageously

17th March 2002. 21 years ago I photographed @penhadow departing the Canadian coast heading towards the Geographic North Pole. He became the first and remains the only person to ski to the North Pole solo and without resupply from Canada . In these last 21 years the sea ice has diminished to such a degree that it remains questionable if this route is possible again in this style, without resupply. There is more water , the sea ice is more mobile and there is less of it . It was also my first time seeing this one and only frozen ocean. Apart from being the most unique environment on our earth it is also the most important as we are all connected to it in our daily lives . ❤️

Delighted to be the first guest on @tictrac new podcast series entitled “Empower Hour” You’ll find out about the psychological challenges and some of my solutions that made it possible for me to be the first to reach the North Geographic Pole...alone! Check out their page to find out how to listen.

15 September, we now know was when the Arctic Ocean sea ice reached its minimum extent this year. It is the second lowest area on record. The lowest recorded area was in 2012 and the third lowest area was last year. Remember, sea-ice loss is habitat loss. The image is of one of Arctic Mission’s two 50 ft sailing vessels heading into the Central Arctic Ocean in 2017.

Arctic Ocean sea ice not only supports a unique floating ice-reef ecosystem, but throughout human history has provided an effective barrier to all shipping until recently (except a handful of icebreakers). As satellite coverage has revealed the area of sea ice to have been reducing over the last 40 years, so the opportunity for commercial exploitation of this previously untouched region of our planet has increased for: cargo shipping; cruise shipping; industrial-scale fishing; and vessels enabling mineral extraction from the seabed. And with shipping comes a host of risks to the region’s wildlife as you will discover in future posts ... #OceanConservation #ArcticOcean #CentralArcticOcean #Protect90North #NorthPole #Wildlife #BioDiversity #Nature #Environment

It was this week during Arctic Mission 2017, while heading out of the Central Arctic Ocean and back to our home port in Nome (Alaska)... The insight occurred to me, after much thought, that the Arctic’s sea-ice cover is not just a habitat but more specifically is a unique ‘floating ice-reef ecosystem’ that supports both plants and animals including some of the worlds best-loved mammals. Where have you had your eureka moments ... in the bath, on a walk...? #OceanConservation #ArcticOcean #CentralArcticOcean #Protect90North #NorthPole #Environment #Nature #Wildlife #Biodiversity

Here are just some of the animals which will thank us for creating the wildlife reserve in the international waters around the North Pole. So ... and not necessarily in the order they appear: Bowhead Whale (world’s 2nd largest animal at 100,000kg); Beluga Whale (aka the season canary’ as it’s thought it may have the most sophisticated language of all marine species); ribbon sea - (am I strikingly good-looking or wot?!); walrus, of which all three (sub) species live in the Arctic Ocean. So many more animals will be introducing themselves to you in the months ahead. #OceanConservation #ArcticOcean #CentralArcticOcean #Protect90North #NorthPole #Environment #Nature #Wildlife #Biodiversity