John Hoelscher

POLAR adventurer John Hoelscher has started a business to take people to the last frontier where they will travel by dog sleds driven by Inuits. The Lammermoor Beach 41-year-old who has spent a quarter of his life in below zero temperatures will use his expertise to involve people in adventure holidays. "They will see polar bears, musk ox, caribou, seals and whales while travelling across a frozen continent on a dog sled or skis," he said.

"As tour guide, I will join Inuit (formerly Eskimo) people driving the sleds across the polar icecap during the thaw when the land is alive with native animals and birds mating and playing. "This will be a once-in-a-lifetime adventure where travellers will follow the trails made by explorers in country virtually unchanged since time began." The former Yeppoon school student is a renowned explorer who joined a mate, Lonnie Dupre, in becoming the first people to circumnavigate Greenland over five years. Their journey by kayak and dogsled made news around the world and gave them fame among their peers.

They told their story in National Geographic, Australian Geographic, Readers Digest, numerous newspapers and magazines and in a one-hour television special screened around the world. Their adventure was told in a superb book called Greenland Expedition, Where Ice is Born, by Lonnie Dupre (ISBN 1-55971-707-6 hard cover) published by NorthWord Press, Minnesota). Photographs of sunrise through ice caves, icebergs, dog teams, kayaks in a wilderness of pack ice and the two of them paddling into curling, ice-laden waves fired armchair travellers' imaginations. John Hoelscher is unique on the Capricorn Coast.

He is a polar adventurer in a community where he has palm trees, sand, fishing and surfing at his front door at Lammermoor Beach.

The Capricorn Coast sportsman in him has a kitbag with Aussie rules boots next to scuba gear, near the fishing reels and rods with the surfboard on the wall. But in his photo albums he is wearing brightly coloured polar clobber with thick beanies and leather gloves and husky dogs licking him while rocks and ice surround him.

In most of his photos he is the only colour other than black and white of the surroundings.

This is the world where his mind travels when he is relaxing.

He recalls four years at Casey and Mawson research stations in Antarctica and on Macquarie Island.

In these deep frozen remote outposts, his love of life at below zero grew into a passion.

John Hoelscher, instead of recalling the grip on a golf club, can feel the pull of a nine or 11-dog husky team on a sled.

Instead of thinking about a one-hour surf at Kemp Beach, he knows what it feels like to jointly paddle a plastic kayak for 17 hours straight looking for a safe landfall to pitch camp for the night on a frozen wasteland. He can recall the memories, the hazards, the "concern" he and Lonnie had paddling the kayak 1250 miles through ice that is trying to crush them while they set a new record for the longest distance travelled. But he does not want old memories to look back on. His new venture of guided kayak and dog sled adventures and Inuit cultural exchanges in Greenland will keep him looking ahead rather than back. "I don't know if the Capricorn Coast is the market for this business," he said.

"Maybe one or two people here want to face such a challenge.

"It won't be five-star by Australian standards but anyone joining the adventure will know they are in safe hands and will come home with stories to tell for the rest of their life."

This business venture is so new John Hoelscher has not priced it.

It will involve two routes the traveller can choose to reach the same destination.

Adventurers will leave Brisbane for Copenhagen, in Denmark, fly to Greenland by Boeing 737 jet then take a Dash 7, similar to those on Rockhampton-to-Brisbane routes, to Qaanaaq (pronounced karnark), the jumping off point for the ice crossing. The second option would involve flying from Brisbane to Ottawa, jet plane to Resolute Bay, followed by a Twin Otter flight to Qaanaaq.

The tour group will be no more than a dozen people and because the trips can only be undertaken during the thaw there will only be two dog sledding adventures a year.

John Hoelscher is obviously not planning to get rich with these trips.

"I just want to keep my interest in polar regions alive," he said.

"I want to use my skills, keep them sharp and at the same time introduce people to a fascinating adventure.

"Every one of the treks will be an adventure because no one can predict what will happen from one moment to the next in the polar regions."

The polar adventures could be regarded as Billy Crystal in City Slickers meets polar bears on ice.

But John Hoelscher sees it far more seriously because he believes everyone taking the trip with him will experience an adventure not available anywhere else in the world.

"We will be in the high arctic region where we will learn the way the Inuit acquire their food and live," he said.

"Adventurers will learn how to travel with dogs, the satisfaction of the quiet of the Arctic, no motors, the peace and quiet, the pitter-patter of paws, the wind through the tent at night, the local food and the warm hearts of the locals.

"The people up there are very friendly and we'll be travelling by dog team and sitting on the sled, or skiing.

"There will be some harder days and some good days as well.

"The adventurers will be surviving in the Arctic.

"It's a good challenge.

"We won't be doing it in the extreme times when it is very windy and very cold.

"We will be doing it in the springtime when it is very pleasant with 23 hours of daylight and temperatures down to about minus five degrees or minus 10. "That's fairly pleasant, that's good dog sledding weather in the Arctic."

Asked could it all blow-up, could there be out-of-season storms, John Hoelscher said: "Oh of course, anywhere in the Arctic and the polar regions you can get out-of-season storms.

"But you have back-ups like contingency plans, very good equipment, good tents, villages where we could stay, some insulated wooden huts that hunters use, and of course there are rescue facilities available such as helicopters and boats."

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John Hoelscher