Sir Ranulph Fiennes – Britain’s Greatest Explorer

Inspirational Keynote Speaker -

Ranulph Fiennes is the only man alive ever to have travelled around the Earth’s circumpolar surface (more people have been on the Moon!)

His record-breaking expeditions include travel by riverboat, hovercraft, manhaul sledge, skidoo, Land Rover and ski…

Now he’s taking on a new record-setting challenge, the Global Reach Challenge, to raise funds for Marie Curie. By completing the challenge he’ll become the first person to have crossed both polar ice caps and climbed the highest mountains on each continent.

Key Facts

  • First to cross Antarctic and Arctic Ocean (with Charles Burton).
  • First to circumnavigate the world along its polar axis (with Charles Burton). ‘This 3 year, 52 000 mile odyssey took intricate planning, 1900 sponsors, a 52 person team to handle, complex communications, meticulous planning and iron determination mixed with flexibility. The circumnavigation has never been successfully repeated.
  • Led the first hovercraft expedition up the longest river in the world (the Nile) in 1968/1969.
  • Achieved world record for unsupported northerly polar travel in 1990.
  • Led the team that discovered the lost city of Ubar on the Yemeni border in 1992 (after seven previous search expeditions over a 26 year period).
  • Achieved world first in 1992/1993 by completing the first unsupported crossing of the Antarctic Continent (with Mike Stroud). This was the longest unsupported polar journey in history.
  • In 2003, only 3½ months after a massive heart attack, 3 day coma and double bypass, Ranulph Fiennes (with Mike Stroud) achieved the first 7x7x7 (Seven marathons in seven consecutive days on all seven continents).
  • March 2005, climbed Everest (Tibet-side) to within 300m of summit raising £2 million for the British Heart Foundations new research MRI scanner.