Running Into Royalty at the Summit?

Turns out he's not a contender — but a worthy foe he would have been, as are the courageous soldiers he's traveling with.

When I first scanned the headline on Yahoo! News that Prince Harry would be attempting a trek to the North Pole, I panicked.

Had the third-in-line to the British throne entered the Quark Expeditions contest?! Do you know how many Twitter followers and Facebook fans this guy probably has (he would totally rack up the votes)? Was the Queen going to bribe the judge's panel with the Crown Jewels to catapult her grandson into the top five? Can Buckingham Palace boys even blog??

As I read the article in full, however, not only were my fears allayed, but I stopped feeling like such a bad-ass for entering this competition in the first place. All this time I've been entertaining delusions of grandeur of me on this trip of a lifetime: I envision myself as a bold adventurer, breaking through ice floes and wrestling with Ursus martimus by day, then toiling away with frostbitten fingers on my MacBook by night to blog about my fantastical adventures for Quark fans around the world.

I'm humbled, however, as I read about the men that Prince Harry is planning on joining this April on his trek to 90N. The group is made of two servicemen who lost limbs in Afghanistan, plus two others who were maimed in the conflict. They're aiming to be the first amputees to trek 200 miles unaided to the Pole from Siberia. The journey will raise money for Walking With the Wounded, an organization dedicated to rehabilitating wounded troops.

If that's not the true spirit of adventure, I don't know what is. Makes me realize that sipping hot cocoa (or maybe some Dewar's) from the comfort of my nuclear icebreaker cabin while I update my Facebook status to read "Walrus alert in full force!" is pretty cushy and not really indicative of any true "courage" on my part. It also makes me appreciate even more the possibility of ascending to the top of the Earth while others are sacrificing so much to protect it.

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