The first circumnavigation: 1915 - 22

"The church says the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in a shadow than in the church"

I519: Portuguese explorer, Ferdinand Magellan, was sponsored by Spain to command an armada of 5 ships and 270 men into unchartered waters and the unknown... Like Columbus before him, Magellan was convinced that by sailing west across the Atlantic he would discover the rumoured western passage to the rich Spice Islands of Indonesia. Unlike Columbus, Magellan did it! Though, he did not complete the journey, his expedition became a landmark in the history of navigation and still hailed by his modern-day successors!

1522: 3 years  and 96,000km later, the spice-laden Victoria and 18 bedraggled crew limped home to Spain, minus Magellan, who died en route in the Philippines, leaving Juan Sebastian Elcano to complete the journey. Along the way, they battled some of the stormiest seas on earth, faced starvation, sickness, mutinies and encountered hostile natives. But it is Magellan's name that is immortalise in the world of pioneer explorers and - most famously as the - 1st circumnavigation of the globe.

Magellan named the ocean the Pacific (meaning 'peaceful')

because it was calm and pleasant when he entered it.