A dream trip to the magnetic North Pole for Devizes adventurer Nick Heal turned into disappointment when it was curtailed just a week after it began.

Mr Heal, 42, had planned for the adventure for more than a year and it was his boyhood dream.

But just 60 miles into the 360 nautical mile expedition the team leader Richard Bull stopped the trip because he was ill. Two other team members had dropped out before him.

This meant the remaining nine members of the expedition had to turn back near the west coast of Cornwallis Island in the Canadian Arctic.

Mr Heal, who paid £7,000 for the trip, said: “The time I had on the ice was fantastic. We experienced minus 50 degrees celsius at night and daytime temperatures of between minus 25 and 30 degrees celsius.

“It was like going back to the ice age and often we saw polar bear prints so knew they were ever present.

“We had a week on the ice when it should have been three weeks. I’m absolutely gutted that it was curtailed as I have missed out on a trip of a lifetime. I probably won’t be able to do the trip in the future, they are expensive.”

The expedition members did the trek by walking or using skis and took all their supplies on sledges.

Mr Heal, of Mayenne Place, is used to trekking in the Arctic having visited Baffin Island near the Arctic Circle in 2008 with Richard Bull.

Mr Heal, an operative for a utilities company in Swindon, said he was unhappy that Mr Bull cut short the trip to the magnetic North Pole without consultation.

He said: “Richard should have called a meeting in the tent with us all saying he was too ill too continue and asking if we wanted to continue. We had enough experience in the team to go on but also I believed there were support team members in place who would be able to step in and take over.”

Mr Heal used the trip to raise money for the NSPCC charity but said some people who had pledged to sponsor him were not going to because he had not completed the trip, which he fully understands.

He said: “I was hoping to raise approximately £1,800. At the moment I have collected £415 and would like to thank friends and colleagues who have donated.”

Mr Bull, who is based in Gloucestershire and has run Arctic expeditions for 15 years, declined to reveal the nature of his illness. However, he said: “The reason the expedition was called off was because doctors in the UK told me to come off the ice immediately.

“Because I was the expedition leader and the only one with the main experience it meant the expedition was over. Safety is paramount for a team of novices on the ice. They didn’t have enough experience to carry on. I had planned this expedition for over two years. We were the first British mixed team to attempt to walk to the magnetic North Pole unsupported (without air support, dogs, resupplies).”