L autore ci narra chiaramente e senza troppi tecnicismi la nascita e le avventure dell' Erebus,che nata alla fine delle guerre napoleoniche venne successivamente attrezzata per l'esplorazione dell'artico,per le ricerche sul magnetismo e per scoprire il passaggio al nord ovest del circolo polare artico. Palin presents so many details of the individuals and the geography that the book is easy to read and highly informative. In some ways, there are parallels with this book which follows the adventures of HMS Erebus, built in a Pembroke dockyard as a 'bomb' vessel but kitted out pretty quickly for Polar exploration.

However I confess I'd forgotten that the Erebus had a number of voyages of exploration before the final one. Written] with a wry enthusiasm, bolstered by his own experiences as an eminent explorer and film-maker .When I made a journey to the Antarctic Peninsula in 2014 the sight of a single whale was enough to bring everyone out on deck, reaching for cameras and binoculars. It might be said it was James Cook who defined the Antarctic Region, and James Ross who discovered it’ wrote Captain Scott.

In September 2014, marine archaeologists discovered HMS Erebus, her snapped stern furred with algae, on the Arctic seabed. Le due navi non faranno mai ritorno e le numerose spedizioni di soccorso porteranno solo al ritrovamento di alcune tombe e vari oggetti appartenuti ad uomini della spedizione.So berichtet uns Palin ausführlich von den Reisen der beiden Schiffe, inklusive ausführlicher Charakterisierungen der jeweiligen Kapitäne und Offiziere. The ship was filled with fascinating people: the dashing and popular James Clark Ross, who charted much of the ‘Great Southern Barrier’; the troubled John Franklin, whose chequered career culminated in the Erebus 's final, disastrous expedition; and the eager Joseph Dalton Hooker, a brilliant naturalist – when he wasn't shooting the local wildlife dead. The ship was filled with fascinating people: the dashing and popular James Clark Ross, who charted much of the 'Great Southern Barrier'; the troubled John Franklin, whose chequered career culminated in the Erebus's final, disastrous expedition; and the eager Joseph Dalton Hooker, a brilliant naturalist - when he wasn't shooting the local wildlife dead.