We are back into our regular routine today inching our way south. If it was a race, we would definitely be the tortoise. Not quite reptilian, we did manage a few welcome glides during our steady polar plod on snow that continues to be... (I'm afraid to say it out loud for fear of jinxing us) fairly level.

We still have over 500 nautical miles between us and the pole - although I rarely think about the end. It's just too far away and there is much that can happen between now and then. Instead, we employ a simple cookie cutter strategy. Each day we stamp out our routine: travel, rest, eat, travel, rest, eat... Set up camp, eat, sleep, eat, travel... Ad Infinitum.

We don't worry (too much) about distance. We just stamp out cookie after cookie after cookie. It actually gets fun after a while... (At least that's what we tell ourselves ;)

We were all excited about the distance we covered, 'its a lot further than I thought we had gone,' observed Bill. Meanwhile, Dongsheng spent a large part of the day reviewing his college days and regaled us with one yarn that Bill and I now affectionately call, 'a tale of two watermelons.'

Just yesterday, a report by UN climate scientist found that arctic sea ice is melting 40 percent faster than the panel estimated just a few years ago.Every year more and more polar bears are starving and drowning as they have to swim farther and farther to reach solid ice. Some are even turning to cannibalism in a desperate search for food. Two-thirds of all polar bears -including all bears in Alaska - will be extinct by 2050 if current trends continue. The rest of the species will be gone by the end of the century.

Since the 1997 Kyoto agreement, the level of carbon dioxide pollution increased 6.5 percent, climate change has worsened and its impacts are greater than anticipated. Once frozen summer Arctic sea ice now has open ship passages. In Greenland and Antarctica, ice sheets have lost trillions of tons of ice. Glaciers in Europe, South America, Asia and Africa are shrinking faster than before.

Sea level has risen by about an inch and a half. Droughts and wildfires have turned more severe worldwide. And the species impacted are so many that the Center for Biological Diversity struggled to pare down the list to 350 for its "350 Reasons we need to get to 350ppm: 350 Species Threatened by Global Warming" web installation (http://350.biologicaldiversity.org).

Image: Dong, Bill and Eric at the end of the day.

Remember, it's cool to be cold. Save the Poles. Save the planet.

For more information, please visit www.savethepoles.com

For information about guided Antarctic expeditions, please visit http://www.antarctic-logistics.com/

For information about Bill Hanlon's foundation, please visit www.basichealthinternational.org

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