Beauty Of Nature Polo To Polo Part : 1

A hundred years ago

there were one and a half
billion people on Earth.

Now, over six billion
crowd our fragile planet.

But even so, there are still places
barely touched by humanity.

This series will take to the last wildernesses

and show you the planet
and its wildlife

as you have never
seen them before.

Imagine our world without sun.

Male Emperor Penguins are facing
the nearest that exists on planet Earth -

winter in Antarctica.

It's continuously dark

and temperatures drop
to minus seventy degrees centigrade.

The penguins stay
when all other creatures have fled

because each guards a treasure:

A single egg rested
on the top of its feet

and kept warm beneath
the downy bulge of its stomach.

There is no food
and no water for them,

and they will not see
the sun again for four months.

Surely no greater ordeal
is faced by any animal.

As the sun departs
from the Antarctic

it lightens the skies
in the far north.

It's March

and light returns
to the high Arctic,

sweeping away
four months of darkness.

A polar bear stirs.

She has been in her den
the whole winter.

Her emergence marks
the beginning of spring.

After months of confinement underground

she toboggans down the slope.

Perhaps to clean her fur,

perhaps for sheer joy.

Her cubs gaze out
of their bright new world

for the very first time.

The female calls them,

but this steep slope is not
the easiest place to take your first steps.

But they are hungry

and eager to reach their mother,

who's delayed feeding them
on this special day.

Now she lures them with the promise of milk,

the only food the cubs have known
since they were born

deaf and blind beneath the snow
some two months ago.

Their mother has not eaten
for five months

and has lost half her body weight.

Now she converts the last of her fat
reserves into milk for her cubs.

The spring sun brings warmth

but also a problem for the mother.

It starts to melt the sea ice.

That is where she hunts for the seal
she needs to feed her cubs.

And she must get there
before the ice breaks up.

For now though
it's still minus thirty degrees

and the cubs must have
the shelter of the den.

It's six days since the bears emerged

and spring is advancing rapidly.

But even now blizzards
can strike without warning.

Being so small,

the cubs are easily chilled and they will
be more comfortable resting in the den.

But their mother must keep them out and active.

She's becoming weak from hunger

and there's no food
on these nursery slopes.

The sea ice still holds firm,

but it won't last much longer.

Day 10,

and the mother has led
her cubs a mile from the den.

It's time to put them to the test.

They've grown enormously in confidence,

but they don't have
their mother's sense of urgency.

At last it seems that they're
ready for their journey

and they're only just in time,

for a few miles from the coast
the ice is already splitting.

Now the mother can start hunting
for the seals they must have,

but she's leading her cubs
into a dangerous new world.

Nearly half of all cubs die
in their first year out on the ice.

Summer brings 24 hours of sunlight

and the thawing shifting landscape.

Further south the winter snows have
almost cleared from the Arctic tundra.

Northern Canada's wild frontier.

Here nature stages
one of her greatest dramas -

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