Exploration

People have dreams. Some dream to be the richest person in the world, some dream to be the fastest man/woman on earth, others dream to have a simple life free of worry.

But there are some that dream to go where no one has gone before - to push the boundaries of what is possible when everything is stacked against them in achieving this goal. They are Explorers

The UK has had a rich history of explorers, some of the them are very famous, others do not become famous but are equally as pioneering. Here we have a list of some of the most well known British and international explorers from the past and present.

Sir Edmund Hillary

On the 29th May 1953, Sir Edmund Hillary and sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first people ever to climb Mt. Everest, the highest mountain on Earth. There was a lot of talk about whether Tenzing or Sir Edmund reached the top first, but it did not matter to them. It was a team effort and one could not have climbed without the other.

Sir Ernest Shacklton

Sir Ernest shackleton was an Antarctic explorer and is most famous for an incredible journey of survival when his whole expedition was trapped in Antarctica for a year and a half. Incredibly not a single person on the expedition died and all came back safe and sound.

Captain Robert Falcon Scott

Captain Scott was a pioneering field research scientist. He did a lot of research on a number of expeditions but it is his legendary and fatal attempt to be the first team to reach the South Pole that he is known for. His team succeeded in reaching the pole, though did so a month after the Norwegian Amundsen and his party.

James Ross

Between 1839 and 1843 Ross commanded an Antarctic expedition comprising the vessels HMS Erebus and HMS Terror and charted much of the coastline of the Antarctic continent. In 1841, Ross discovered the Ross Sea, Victoria Land, and the volcanoes Mount Erebus and Mount Terror, which were named for the expedition's vessels. They sailed for 250 miles along the edge of the low, flat-topped ice shelf they called the Victoria Barrier, later named The Ross Ice Shelf. Both Erebus and Terror where later lost in the ill fated Franklin Expedition.

Sir John Franklin

Sir John Franklin was an officer in the Royal Navy and an Arctic explorer. He was born in Spilsby, Lincolnshire and joined the navy at the age of 15. Although he took part in the great sea battle of Trafalgar, he is best remembered for his surveys of the Arctic. He made maps of over 3000 miles of the coast line of north Canada. He died in 1847, on his last Arctic expedition to find elusive the North-West Passage.