On the deck of the _Fram_ were ninety-six Eskimo dogs. Amundsen said, “The Eskimo dog is the best animal to endure the cold and to pull sledges over the ice and snow.” Amundsen gave each man in the crew a number of dogs to be in his care. The men named their dogs and began making friends with them as soon as the journey began. They must have the dogs ready to work well with them by the time they reached the Antarctic. On the deck of the boat too were skis and snowshoes, heavy blankets, suits of Eskimo clothes, suits of reindeer skins, canned meat and other foods, and lumber ready to fit together for a house. Amundsen had tried to make sure that he and his men would _be lucky_. The first part of the journey was through the North Sea along the coast of Norway. Then the _Fram_ sailed into the Atlantic Ocean. As they traveled farther and farther south, the weather got warmer each day. The men saw the sun get higher and higher in the sky each noon. Then they came to a place where the sun at noon was almost directly over their heads. They were then halfway between the North Pole and the South Pole. [Illustration: AMUNDSEN’S EQUIPMENT, NOW IN A MUSEUM] The men put on light summer clothes. The dogs kept under the shelter built for them, but still they suffered from the heat. The _Fram_ went on farther south, but the weather began to grow cooler and cooler. The farther the boat went from the place where the sun was almost directly over head at noon, the cooler the weather was. The men put on warmer clothing and the dogs left their shelters. By New Year’s Day the _Fram_ was in the icy waters of the Antarctic. The men saw huge pieces of ice floating in the water. The boat had to make its way through the ice. In about two weeks more, they reached a wall of ice about one hundred feet high. Amundsen was expecting that wall of ice, which was the edge of the great field of ice called _The Great Ice Barrier_. The _Fram_ could go no farther. The men unloaded the supplies on the ice. Not far from that spot, they dug into the ice and made a cellar where they stored their supplies. Over it they set up the house they had brought from Norway. They called their new home _Framheim_, which means _Fram home_. In January the weather in the Antarctic is much like June weather in the far north. Day after day the men watched the sun go in a circle around their home on the ice. The sun there moved much the same as they had seen it move in the Arctic where Hammerfest lies. At Hammerfest, that town which is farther north than any other town, the sun is in the east in the early morning, in the south at noon, in the west in the late afternoon, and in the north at midnight. But in the Antarctic the men saw the sun in the east in the early morning, in the _north_ at noon, in the west in the late afternoon, and in the _south_ at midnight.