A WORLD renowned Arctic explorer last week visited Tavistock's Mount House School to give an informal presentation on his most recent adventure – a solo trek to the North Pole. Pen Hadow was the latest speaker to talk about his experiences, at the school's Oracle Lecture series for pupils and parents. His latest venture made Pen the only person to have trekked solo without re-supply from Canada to the North Pole, and the only Briton to have trekked unaided to both Poles. Pen, whose son is a pupil at Mount House, talked about the preparation needed for the trek and practising the specific skills he would need to complete the journey when he would be dragging all his food, his tent and other equipment on a sled with no outside help. He also described a moment of the journey when a polar bear thrusted its head aggressively through the flap of his tent. Instinctively, Pen reached for the nearest hard object, in this case a saucepan, and rapped the bear sharply on the nose. For a moment he wondered whether he had done the right thing, or whether he would succeed in just provoking the bear, but to his relief, after a few seconds the bear withdrew from the tent and went off looking for some prey who would not fight back. After the lecture, pupils asked Pen about a bottle of water he had brought with him. He explained it was melted snow brought back from the North Pole as a souvenir. Pen is an active and enthusiastic campaigner on the environment, and is determined to make a difference in the global climate change debate.