The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - Travel
Travelling life
Neil Oliver TV presenter
Do you travel often?
For work, I’ve been in the US around Alabama twice this year working on a KKK documentary, and a few weeks ago I was in Cape Breton in Canada. In the last three years, I’ve been out to Australia more than a dozen times to film Coast Australia. I’ve got so used to jet lag that I really don’t suffer too much now. I don’t travel much purely for pleasure.
Your earliest memory of travelling abroad?
We didn’t travel much when I was little for financial reasons, mum was a housewife and dad worked for a plant hire company. But when I was four and my sisters were nine and 14, the family flew to Majorca. We stayed in El Arenal. Back in the early Seventies there were only a few hotels; it wasn’t the party resort it is now! I have a clear memory of riding on donkeys and being bamboozled by the unusual food.
What do you need for a perfect holiday?
When travelling with my wife Trudi and our two boys, one of our favourite destinations is Elie, a beautiful coastal town in Fife. We rent a house there and for the four of us it’s just completely relaxing. We don’t do much – we walk on the beach, go to the pub for lunch, read and watch movies – very low-tech. People often forget how much the UK has to offer.
Your most adventurous holiday?
Without a doubt, South Orkney – an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Antarctica. I’d flown from Brize Norton to Ascension Island, then on to Port Stanley, which we sailed from on a 50ft yacht. It took almost 10 days. We barely saw anyone else en route, apart from the odd boat from Ushuaia transporting researchers to the remote islands. It was notionally summertime, so the sea conditions weren’t as bad as they could have been. Once there we spent 10 days observing the wildlife – it was like a soup of life, from whales to penguins, dolphins, seals and birds including southern petrels and terns.
Best family trip abroad?
Down Under – in 2013 for six weeks and then in 2014 for six months to Australia, and then three months to New Zealand last year. The atmosphere in Australia is so positive, perhaps because their economy is a lot better than ours. It was a really big adventure for the children – we put them into school in Sydney, which we used as our base when I was filming. They loved Cleft Island, the Torres Strait Islands, with its reefs and wildlife, and the rugged landscape of the Kimberley. Western Australia is just extraordinary – you get a real sense of remoteness and the age of the world there.
Your one travel essential?
Factor 50 sun cream because I’m fair, a Tilley hat, category-4 protection sunglasses to protect myself from macular degeneration and multi-purpose soft Buffs. I’m a traditionalist and take actual books. I don’t take technology with me if I can avoid it.
What do you hate about travelling?
My pet peeve is when people don’t check in oversized hand luggage and they take up more than their fair share of space in the overhead lockers: it’s selfish.
Where next?
South America, in particular Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia. Neil Oliver was in Western Australia for the Dirk Hartog Voyage of Discovery: Shark Bay 1616 festival to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Dirk Hartog’s landing at Shark Bay. See westernaustralia. com for more information.