This Is What a Polar Explorer Looks Like

There are some things that may not be apparent to a person who has only seen it in two dimensions. It also has the highest average elevation and is the driest continent. The terrain is striped with snow ridges that can be up to six feet high, even after scaling craggy mountains. The white-outs, which Harpreet Chandi describes as like travelling inside a marshmallows, were the only thing he had to do to reach the South Pole.

The captain in the U.K.'s Royal Army Medical Corps took 40 days to complete the 700 mile trek to the pole, skiing while pulling her tent, fuel, sleeping bag and freeze-dried ration on a 200 pound pulk. She used a satellite phone at the end of the day to send a voice message to her family, who updated her 40,000 followers on the social media site. She told them that the journey was about more than her, and that she hoped to inspire people to push their boundaries.

There is no authority that records official polar firsts, but it is believed that the first woman of color to make a solo trek to the South Pole is the daughter and granddaughter of immigrants from India. She is part of a long line of pioneers who competed to be the first to reach the South Pole in the early 20th century. The first successful expedition was led by the Norwegian Roald Amundsen and included skis and sled dogs. They arrived just 34 days before a British team led by Robert Falcon Scott ended in tragedy when all five men died on the way back from injury.

The author of a history of Antarctica, Land of Wondrous Cold says that polar exploration has come a long way since then. The environmental conditions Scott and Amundsen faced are the same today as they were in the past.

The world needs to be tasted!

It is the most remote and inhospitable environment on the planet, and it attracts the popular imagination.

Women have had to overcome their own particular hurdles in modern polar expeditions. The first all-women expedition reached the South Pole in 1993. It was a major achievement to set foot on the frozen planet.

The group tried for four years to get corporate sponsors to fund their attempt. The idea of an all-woman team met with skepticism because of the fact that Bancroft was the first woman to reach the North Pole.

Some of the remarks that executives would come back to me with were, "You traveled with men before" or "You are so small." I had a guy who had a tummy himself, and he had no problem just squeezing my bicep, and pontificating out loud whether or not this was possible.

It took a grassroots campaign of lectures, slide presentations, T-shirt sales, and a grade-school curriculum to pay for their logistical and gear.

It exploded after we got back. It caught people imaginations. Someone would push their eight-year-old daughter in front of me if I stopped on the street.

Maria Leijerstam was the first person to cycle to the South Pole using a specially constructed three-wheeled vehicle. She took pride in the fact that she beat two men, who set off by bicycle with a three-week head-start, by nearly a month.

It is usually the men who get there first, and then the women. I have done the best training. I have done the best preparation and I have the best route. I think it's a message for young girls to have confidence in themselves, because I'm really confident in what I'm about to do.

After returning to the U.K., she began to talk about her adventures with young women and girls of diverse background.

People say the outdoors is for everyone, but it's not always easy to go and do something you know nothing about or not to see anyone that looks like.

When she dreamed of going to the South Pole, she hesitated to identify as a woman of color. She wrote that she was not the image that was expected. My brown skin, my culture are all part of who I am.

Neither of them have met Chandi, but they are thrilled by her accomplishment. Theirs is a small club.

I found her to be inspiring and I think it's important to see a person of color doing something that has been done before.