My life: Tim Jarvis

I was born in Britain to a Scottish mother and an English father. When I was seven, my family relocated to Kuala Lumpur for five years, then Singapore (for seven years), until I returned to Britain to study geomorphology (the scientific study of landforms) at university. I was an independent child and liked solo adventure. In the 1970s, I loved camping in Malaysian jungles with my dog. I became very resourceful, resilient and better at problem-solving because nature throws up different challenges to (those posed by) a man-made environment, which offers very controlled experiences for children.

I am drawn to Antarctica, one of the most remote and most challenging places in the world, because all societal structure is removed. I don't see any sign of humanity there - not even an aircraft in the sky or any human infrastructure. I discover myself by stripping back to the bare minimum. My survival instincts kick in, my senses are sharpened and I feel at my maximum ability: empowered and alive.

I became friends with Ernest Shackleton's granddaughter, Alexandra, after meeting her at an exhibition in London in 2001, which commemorated the Antarctic explorer. I had been invited because (in 1999) I set the record for the fastest unsupported journey to the South Pole (47 days) and the longest unsupported journey in Antarctica (1,580km). About five years later, she asked if I would assemble a team to re-enact her grandfather's famous 1916 rescue mission (during his trans-Antarctic expedition), in which he sailed 1,500km in an old-fashioned lifeboat from Elephant Island - where his 28-strong crew was stranded after his expedition ship sank - to seek help from a whaling station on South Georgia. I said yes immediately. Alexandra is a famous lady and a friend of the royal family. When she asks, you tend to comply. It was a rhetorical question. She didn't say "Will you?", she said, "You will, won't you?" It was a great honour.

It took four years to prepare for the expedition. I received hundreds of applications for the five spots on the voyage. I looked for people with two types of intelligence: literal (they possess specific skills, such as mountaineering and sailing) and divergent (capable of finding solutions in a crisis). I also wanted my crew to have a good sense of humour.

We had to leave modern technology behind and make do with century-old navigation tools, period clothing and an unseaworthy boat. We sailed 800 nautical miles over 12 days from Elephant Island to South Georgia (it took Shackleton 17). And the land crossing from one side of South Georgia to the whaling station took another week. We worked out our location and direction with a compass, a sextant and a chronometer watch, which proved hard on a boat rocking so violently that everyone was seasick. We were focusing on not capsizing. Shackleton never intended to cross the Southern Ocean in a lifeboat, so he only worried about his clothes being breathable and windproof, with thermal woollen layers underneath. The outer layers weren't designed to be waterproof. We just copied what he had. When the first wave came, I got soaked and my clothes never dried properly. I lost 20lbs in 21 days as my body burned thousands of calories to keep warm in the sub-zero temperatures. That was not helped by the fact that my diet consisted of lard, high-protein sledging biscuits, sugary tea and jerky.