what's 1 toe when you have 9 more?

... perhaps not much, say two women adventurers - UNLESS IT'S YOUR BIG TOE

from the AP:

Arctic adventurer Ann Bancroft said her polar trek partner, Liv Arnesen, might have been willing to sacrifice a baby toe so the pair could continue their journey across the Arctic Ocean - ''but the big toe is pretty crucial to an adventurer's lifestyle,'' Bancroft said. Over the weekend, the women called off their 530-mile trip, which they'd initiated to bring attention to global warming, upon discovering that frostbite had attacked Arnesen's left foot.

Just as Bancroft, of Scandia, Minn., and Arnesen, of Norway, were ready to set out last week from Canada, a plane landing nearby crashed into their gear, damaging the binding on one of Arnesen's snowshoes. They tried to patch it with binding from a ski, but from the start Arnesen felt pressure on her left foot.

''Friday morning is when Liv took off her sock, and it gave the two of us a shock,'' Bancroft said. Several of the toes had already started to turn black, Bancroft said. ''She said maybe if this was just my baby toe I wouldn't be so uptight about it,'' Bancroft said.

The pair waited until Saturday morning, but another check showed the problem getting worse. In the few days they spent on the ice, the women encountered harshly cold conditions that exceeded 100 degrees below zero at night.

On the Net: www.bancroftarnesen.com