√Can you drive to Santa’s workshop at the North Pole?

Looking for the ultimate Christmas road trip? You may need to keep searching…

Father Christmas. Santa Claus. Saint Nicholas. Sinterklaas. Whichever name the legendary bearded gift giver goes by in your house, his point of origin each Christmas Eve is generally agreed to be north. Really north.

The North Pole is the geographic point on the globe from where all directions point south, the very top of the map, so to speak.

Fun fact, there is no timezone at the North Pole as whichever direction you head, you enter that zone. It is all time zones at once.

Unlike its southern counterpart, the North Pole doesn’t exist on a continental landmass, and, due to its extreme distance from the equator, is covered year-round by sea ice that is dynamic and fluid in nature.

The perfect spot then, for a secret legendary Christmas workshop and operating base to reach the world’s children (and adults who buy LEGO) on one busy night of the year.

But what if you wanted to pop by on one of the 364 days that Santa is presumed to be home? Can you get there?

It’s no easy feat. There were many expeditions in the 1800s that reached higher and higher latitudes, but the first successful exploration to latitude-90 is largely believed to have been the American Naval Engineer Robert Peary in 1909.

It wasn’t until 1998 that the first car was driven to the North Pole, a Lada Niva Marsh. The first trip saw the cars delivered by parachute but a subsequent trip in 2000 had the Nivas travel from a Russian research base approximately 114km from the Pole. And yes, you could buy the ‘Bronto Marsh’ with tundra-friendly tyres direct from the factory.

For our context of dropping in for cookies and eggnog with Santa though, these feel a little too orchestrated.

The northernmost permanent research facility is Station Alert in Canada. Alert is just north of the 82nd parallel, and still 817km south of the geographic pole.

While there are some access roads around Alert, there are no gazetted roads ‘to’ Alert. If you saw the 2007 Top Gear Polar Special TV episode, James May and Jeremy Clarkson completed their journey to the historic magnetic pole location in their Toyota Hilux Arctic Truck at the 78^th parallel, some 450-odd kilometres south of Station Alert.

So with no roads heading to the North Pole, what about a road that is close?

The northernmost road we can find on a marked map is the town of Longyearbyen on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen.

Longyearbyen (which means Long Year City) is the northernmost settlement with a population greater than 1000 people. It too is on the 78th parallel, a whole 12-latitude lines (each 111km apart) away from Santa’s digs at the Pole.

But Spitsbergen is an island, making a casual jaunt from the European mainland a little more involved.

Should you want to get as close to the jolly red man in the red suit as a major road network will allow, then the E69 highway in Norway is your ticket.

The highway, only fully passable in the summer months, connects mainland Europe, through Germany, then Denmark and Sweden, to Nordkapp (North Cape) on the northernmost tip of the Porsanger Peninsula in Norway.

Route E69 runs for 129km, with 15-odd kilometres made up of tunnels.

If you make the trek, past the colourful fishing villages and dramatic landscape, you are rewarded with a sculpture noting your location, at the northernmost point of the northernmost road in northern Europe.

It’s a globe, erected in 1978, that shows you are at the 71^st parallel.

North, but nearly north enough to feed any magical flying reindeer.

A worthy trip to add to the bucket list, no question, but not a drive that will see you on Santa’s doorstep any time soon.

Thus making the whole optimal location for a ‘secret magical workshop’ thing really make sense. You’ll just have to be good so that Santa comes to you.

Merry Christmas!