My life through a lens

Celebrities share the stories behind their favourite photographs. This week it’s survival expert Ray Mears, 55

1994

Here I am making my first TV appearance, for the BBC series Wild Tracks. I was approached by a producer because I was teaching wilderness survival skills in Sussex. I was asked if I’d do three five-minute items, but I ended up doing six ten-minute pieces because nobody had shown this sort of thing on British TV before. The Rambo films had given survival a bad name, but hopefully we made it respectable again.

2007

For the series Extreme Jungle, I took the actor Ewan McGregor deep into the Honduran rainforest on the trail of a lost civilisation. We flew in by helicopter and white-water rafted for three days before trekking 42km through the jungle. It was an arduous journey, but he was a quick learner and he threw his heart and soul into it. We couldn’t find any more celebrities brave enough to take part.

1997

The Kalahari bushmen of Namibia and I are making fire here – I’m about to blow that kindle into life. We had an interpreter on the TV series World Of Survival, but I could do the things they could do so we communicated through our hands. It was very special and we didn’t realise these people were on the brink of change – diamonds were discovered on their land and they were forced out, their culture all but disappearing.

2008

I never thought I’d find love again after losing my first wife, Rachel, to cancer in 2006, but I was doing a book signing in Newcastle towards the end of 2007 when Ruth [pictured] appeared, with a radiant smile, wielding my book. She arrived with such energy, she literally knocked me off my feet and I fell to the floor. There was an instant connection. We married in 2009. I never dreamt I’d be this happy again.

1966

My father Leslie and I had a close relationship. This is us in the cockpit of a Spitfire at Biggin Hill Airshow in Kent when I was about two years old. My father was a printer by trade and lost a finger when he was a young man – it was crushed when he was cleaning a printing press – but it didn’t slow him down and his zest for life knew no bounds. He died in 2005 and I really miss him.

2005

This is the day I almost died. We’d been filming in Wyoming in the US for a TV show. As the pilot turned the helicopter around at low altitude beneath the wind, we realised we had insufficient power and started heading for earth. The aircraft somersaulted three times after impact with the ground, before skidding to a halt upside down. Incredibly, all four passengers survived. I escaped with bruises, but our cameraman had to retire as a result of his injuries. It could have been much worse.

2010

When the fugitive Raoul Moat went into hiding in dense woodland in Northumbria, I contacted the police offering my tracking services. This is me with the firearms squad after several days’ search. I found evidence of his presence, including food and a bed he’d made from branches. He had avoided leaving footprints. At one point we were within 20 metres of him (he later told police he was visited by a dog, which I think was a police dog), but he probably slipped away when we were called back to base.

1968

I was given this bike for my birthday. I grew up on the North Downs, and loved the outdoors. When I was young, my parents gave me a book called Animal Tracks And Signs which sparked my fascination with bushcraft. I started going on overnight expeditions with a friend tracking foxes. My parents were really great considering I was still at primary school.