Dream it, live it, do it!

The world-renowned explorer Mike Horn recently visited his country of birth to launch a new book. Erns Grundling felt his bone-crushing handshake and spoke to him about his expeditions.

-  Mike Horn

There’s a passage in Mike Horn’s new book Dream of a Lifetime that strikes home: “An average life lasts 30 000 days and it is our duty to make every one count, to make the most of each passing minute. We don’t come into this world to be simple bystanders to our own existence.”

The book is a gripping account of his world-record expedition in 2017 when he did a solo, unaided crossing of Antarctica. He travelled 5 100 km in 57 days, on foot and by kite ski, and had to deal with crevasses, glaciers, temperatures in the region of -50° C – and a dislocated shoulder.

During one of my (hopefully) 30 000 days on Planet Earth, I get the opportunity to interview Mike for an hour at a hotel in Green Point, Cape Town. He’s on a whirlwind visit to South Africa to launch his book. He was born in Johannesburg but has been living for decades in the Swiss village of Château-d’Oex. It sounds like an idyllic place, but Mike is seldom at home. Three nights before our interview, I saw him on TV at the Laureus World Sports Awards in Berlin, Germany.

In the hotel foyer, clean-shaven and dressed in jeans, a black T-shirt and cap, the 54-year-old looks totally different to the grizzled adventurer in the book’s photo section. There, he trudges through an ice desert wearing layer upon layer of protective clothing, his moustache and beard frozen, his nose seriously close to frostbite, with an unfathomable look in his eyes.