Home: the Great Adventure

Last Thursday the British explorer David Hempleman-Adams claimed for Britain the distinction of being the first person to reach the North Pole by balloon, although he missed the exact Pole by about 13 miles.

Apparently, given the height, distance and ice movement over the Pole, a 60-mile margin of error was allowed for (though by whom is unclear).

Good for Hempleman-Adams. As far as I am concerned, his claim stands. Thirteen miles are neither here nor there. If you were looking for a lift from Dublin to Ballina, Co Mayo, and a kind driver dropped you off in Easkey, Co Sligo, you couldn't really object too much.

Britain has so few heroes these days that the media coverage was effusive, to say the least.

The Times hailed the explorer as a singular hero. Apparently DHA abhors the trappings of fame. And he is not one of those dreary explorers who plans everything down to the last pin. One correspondent told of how, when he planned to take part in and report on an Everest attempt, he confessed to having no proper climbing experience: DHA duly showed him "how to dangle from a rope".

Most old Everest hands will admit that's about the only skill needed. Similarly, on a DHA trip to Antarctica, four of the crew were complete novices at sailing. Not in the least surprising to those in the know.

You hardly need to be told that each time DHA sets out on a new adventure, "he swears this trip will be his last". And while one reporter had some "truly, truly horrible times" accompanying the explorer, he could look back and say that "they have also been the best times of my life".

Anyway, according to the Times, DHA "shows us adventure and brightens dull grey lives that most of us spend in office, behind reception desks - and in glue factories".

This last reference is to the family glue factory which was near to bankruptcy when Hempleman-Adams's father became ill: David duly moved in and turned it around.

I was talking about all this the other day to the not-entirely distinguished Toomevara-based Irish explorer Johnny Hacket, who has much in common with Hempleman-Adams. Well, a little in common - Johnny runs the Cornamona glue factory, which has been on the edge of bankruptcy since the day it was established.

Johnny belongs to a rare breed of explorer, never having been been anywhere much beyond the end of his garden in Toomevara. He abhors the trappings of fame for the very good reason of jealousy.

Basically, there is nowhere Johnny has been.

Nevertheless, John has a great love of wilderness, as anyone who has ever seen his garden will know. And every time Johnny plans a new adventure, he swears that this trip will be his first.

However, Johnny has now realised where he has been going wrong.

When he was planning his round-the-world solo yachtsman trip, Johnny spent a full week at the Glenans sailing centre on Bere Island. This left him hopelessly over-qualified.

When he first thought of tackling Everest, Johnny ran up and down Croagh Patrick three times in a week. The boredom put him off mountaineering for ever.

Meanwhile, one of the wouldbe members of a Johnny Hacket expedition told me that while he had some truly, truly horrible times planning the trip, nevertheless, looking back, "they have also been the most horrible times of my life".

Johnny was particularly impressed with the story of how Hempleman-Adams, preparing for the launch of his balloon on the Arctic island of Spitsbergen, managed to recruit four local girls to work with him, for weeks, for nothing, and simply gave each girl a rose just before he took off, just to say thank you.

I told Johnny that according to the Times, "those girls were on an emotional high, and they have not yet come down to earth."

Johnny told me that his girls are on a permanent high, too, one of the inevitable side-effects of working in his glue factory, but he now realises he has made the mistake of paying them, when a few roses from his garden would have done the job a lot better.

As the Times pointed out regarding the great global adventures, if these things were easy, someone would have done them before. Fortunately for Johnny Hacket, they have.

bglacken@irish-times.ie