Celebrity traveller

Steve Backshall

AND YOUR WORST?

I’ve had so many disasters but the worst was getting a hideous case of dysentery in North Sumatra in 1991.

I needed to get to Singapore for treatment so took a five-day, four-night bus journey, bunged up so I wouldn’t explode.

BEST SOUVENIR?

An antique monastery door from Bhutan. It’s unique and has a glorious image of a dragon emblazoned across it.

BEST BOOK?

I love good popular science writing – Parasite Rex by Carl Zimmer; Guns, Germs And Steel by Jared Diamond and I Contain Multitudes by Ed Yong are rip-roaring books.

HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR TIME ON HOLIDAY?

Climbing, kayaking, animal spotting – kind of exactly what I do for a job. The closest I get to relaxing would be freediving training.

It’s about increasing breath hold while diving and relies on lowering your heart rate.

WHERE WOULD YOU REVISIT?

The Himalayas has an endless appeal for me, as does the rainforest.

I’ve spent a lot of time in the Arctic and will be there on an expedition in June. A desert night is also hard to beat.

WHERE NEXT?

I’m currently on an expedition in Yucatán, Mexico. We’re diving in unexplored cave systems and looking for new caves, relics and buried bones. It’s Indiana Jones meets Jacques Cousteau.