Neville Peat
– Longacre - $39.99
Neville Peat
is a widely published, award-winning Dunedin-based author with more than 30
books to his credit. He has spent two summers at Scott Base, NZ’s Antarctic Station on Ross Island and this is his 5th book with Antarctic
themes.
Let’s start
with the whisky. In January 2006 during a restoration project in Shackleton’s
Nimrod Hut at Cape Royds on Ross Island a member of the five man carpentry team
was assigned to removing ice from under the floor. He had removed about 40% of
the basement ice when he found a couple of wooden crates within the ice. The
words Rare and Old were just discernible on the crates. It turned out to be
Mackinlay’s Rare Old Highland Malt Whisky. It was dubbed the whsiky find of the
century and what followed, some while later, was a discussion with the Scottish
whisky company that had acquired the Mackinlay label through a series of
mergers and takeovers – Whyte & Mackay of Glasgow. They expressed strong
interest in obtaining samples of the whisky for chemical analysis. This all
happens in the latter part of the book and is an absolutely fascinating story
in its own right.
Going back
to the beginning though we make three trips to Antarctica with Ernest
Shackleton. Once in 1901 on an expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott when
Shackleton was third lieutenant on the Discovery and on that unsuccessful
attempt to reach the South Pole Shackleton caught the Antarctic bug you might
say and he subsequently made two further major expeditions to the ice one in
1907-09 when they got as close as 97 miles from the South Pole before having to
turn back, the closest anyone had ever got to that point. He returned home to
England a hero and was knighted by the King. Then in 1914-17 he led his
trans-Antarctic expedition for which he is most famous. It is regarded as an
epic feat of stamina and survival. His attempt to cross the Antarctic was
foiled when his ship was crushed in pack ice. His subsequent 16 day, 1500 km
journey to South Georgia to seek rescue for the main expedition group is rated
as one of the greatest small-boat voyages ever accomplished.
In addition
to all the epic adventures, and I use that word epic advisedly, there is also a
significant amount of memoir about the man himself during these years. He was
clearly a complex man, grew up in a teetotaller household, drank very little
himself having been involved in the temperance movement in his teenage days, he
was an adventurer through and through, he was a great leader, a fair man who
never asked of his men anything he wouldn’t do himself, he liked poetry, and
was happily married.
There is
also quite a lot in the book about NZ’s involvement in the region since the
late 1950’s and through to the present day. We have been heavily involved in
the preservation of Shackleton’s hut and thus it was NZ’ers who found the
whisky that had been there for over a hundred years.
The book is
generously illustrated with both grainy black & white photographs from
those long ago expeditions as well as beautiful full colour contemporary
photos.
All in all a
cracking good yarn that I think most would enjoy and particularly those with an
interest in Antarctica and especially Scotch whisky.
I could have talked to Kathryn about this book for half an hour ! Never mind even 8-10 minutes fabout a book on the wonderful Radio New Zealand National is a bonus.
Below a few shots from the many in the book.
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