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Hello and thank you very much for downloading the Scotland Outdoors podcast. I'm Mark

Stephen. Now to be honest, this is not the midweek podcast which we originally intended

bringing you. But I learned at the weekend there that one of Scotland's leading, one of the most

preeminent polar explorers and adventurers, Myrtle Simpson, had just celebrated her 90th birthday.

And it put me in mind of an extended interview, which Helen Needham and I did with her back in 2016.

She is an extraordinary woman. I hope you enjoy it.

To be a polar explorer, you don't need great keep-fit muscles. It's all in the mind.

And once you've got your anorak hood on and pulling the sledge like that, that was crossing

green then actually.

That's the day the sun came back, that magic day.

Once the sun came back, you know, there's a reason for going, but up until then it had

been dark and you put your anork hood on and you can't communicate with

you're on your own. It's not keep fit muscles from the gym. It's good old-fashioned women's

stuff of slogging on. Now for the next half hour, Helen and I are going to be talking to somebody

pretty remarkable. She was a mountaineer, a canoeist.

The first woman to ski across the Greenland ice cap has been variously referred to as a tough

cookie and the mother of Scottish skiing. And she was recently awarded the polar medal by the

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