The White Desert by Noel Barber is a unique first-hand account of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1957/58 which successfully completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica, via the South Pole. British novelist and journalist Noel Barber accompanied Dr Vivian Fuch's and Sir Edmund Hillary on the adventure and became the first Brit to reach the South Pole since Scott's ill-fated expedition in 1912. Flown in on an American plane, he was able to watch Fuchs and Hillary converging on the Pole from the opposite ends of the continent, across the white desert to this strange little oasis. Despite the hardships and intense cold, Barber found himself drawn to Antarctica: “I went there to record the adventures of two great men, with no knowledge of what lay in store for me; I left three months later with an indefinable feeling of excitement, to which is added a secret hope that I hardly dare to admit, even to myself, that one day I may be able to return. Published by Travel Book Club, 1958. In good condition with dustjacket.