1841, nearly sixty years
before; that this expedition also was able to land a few miles to the
east of the large bay in a small bay, named Balloon Bight, and from
there to ascend the Ice Barrier, which heretofore had been considered
an insurmountable obstacle to further advance toward the south.

In 1901 the _Discovery_ steamed along the Barrier and confirmed in
every respect what the _Southern Cross_ had observed. Land was also
discovered in the direction indicated by Ross, namely, King Edward VII.
Land. Scott, too, landed in Balloon Bight, and, like his predecessors,
saw the large bay to the west.

In 1908 Shackleton arrived there on the _Nimrod_. He, too, followed
along the edge of the Ice Barrier. He came to the conclusion that
disturbances had taken place in the Ice Barrier. The shore line of
Balloon Bight, he thought, had changed and merged with the large bay to
the west. This large bay, which he thought to be of recent origin, he
named Bay of Whales. He gave up his original plan of landing there, as
the Ice Barrier appeared to him too dangerous for the establishment of
winter quarters.

It was not difficult to determine that the bay shown on Ross's map and
the so-called Bay of Whales are identical; it was only necessary to
compare the two maps. Except for a few pieces that had broken off from
the Barrier, the bay had remained the same for the last seventy years.
It was therefore possible to assume that the bay did not owe its origin
to chance and that it must be underlaid by land, either in the form of
sand banks or otherwise.

This bay we decided upon as our base of operations. It lies 400 miles
from the English station in McMurdo Sound and 115 miles from King
Edward VII. Land. We could therefore assume that we should be far
enough from the English sphere of interest and need not fear crossing
the route of the English expedition. The reports concerning the
Japanese station on King Edward VII. Land were indefinite: we took it
for granted, however, that a distance of 115 miles would suffice.

On August 9, 1910, we left Norway on the _Fram_, the ship that had
originally been built for Nansen. We had ninety-seven superb Eskimo
dogs and provisions for two years. The first harbor we reached was
Madeira. There the last preparations were made for our voyage on the
Ross Barrier--truly not an insignificant distance which we had to
cover, namely, 16,000 nautical miles from Norway to the Bay of Whales.
We had estimate