Ernest Shackleton was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions in the early twentieth century. In 1914 he set out to cross Antarctica from sea to sea via the South Pole, but his ship Endurance became trapped in pack ice in the Weddell Sea and was crushed and sank in November 1915. The crew camped on the drifting ice until it broke up, then escaped in lifeboats to Elephant Island. Shackleton and five companions then sailed a small open boat roughly 1,300 kilometres to South Georgia, a stormy voyage that became his most famous exploit. From there they reached rescue, and every member of the expedition survived. Shackleton died in 1922 in South Georgia during a later expedition.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.