By plane and by skis, a steady stream of visitors is flocking to the South Pole in time for the centennial celebrations of two pioneering Antarctic expeditions.
A hundred years ago, on Dec. 14, 1911, Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his team became the first humans to reach the geographic South Pole, which sits in a lifeless desert nearly 1,000 miles from the Antarctic coast.
A little more than a month later, on Jan. 17, 1912, British explorer Robert Falcon Scott and his team also reached the South Pole, but they died on the return journey.
Today, some intrepid travelers still make it to Earth’s southernmost point, though they’re only a small fraction of the approximately 30,000 people who visit Antarctica each year, according to the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators.
