My Haven

The Escape To The Chateau presenter, 61, in the kitchen of his restored home in France

1 OUR BIG DAY

Whenever I see this picture of my wedding to Angel Adoree in November 2015, I feel tired. We found the dilapidated Chateau-de-la-motte Husson in October 2014, arrived the following January, and had ten months to get ready for a wedding with 200 guests, including installing flushing toilets. This photo represents a victory after months of hard work and sleepless nights. We had an amazing weekend – even the local mayor learned some English to speak to us.

2 BY THE BOOK

Angel and I bought this little Mrs Beeton first edition – I love the fact that it features everything from folding napkins to cooking a boar. After that we found the volume that’s under it here, Beeton’s Book Of Garden Management. Angel and I love to flick through them and learn. Our garden design follows the Beeton book and we’re aiming to get our walled garden back to how it was a century ago.

3 TREASURE CHEST

My great-grandfather was in the artillery then the Indian army, and this was his writing case, with a blotter and inkwell inside. There’s a real sense of history to it. I was in the Army for 20 years and moved a lot. I keep my medals in there, plus the first teeth and locks of hair of my older children James and Charlotte, and my son Arthur, seven, and daughter Dorothy, six.

4 TOTALLY WILD

The children’s adventure book Swallows And Amazons can come to life around a chateau like this. My eldest lad James had his first penknife when he was six, and Arthur will have his too, as well as a bow and arrow for proper child’s play. I’m a country boy and we’ve built a hide so that Arthur,

Dorothy and I can watch the herons, kingfishers and red squirrels. This is me with Angel, Arthur and Dorothy outside our home.

5 STICKING WITH IT

I grew up in Ulster, where men have blackthorn sticks like this one. I remember my grandfather walking with it, then my dad, and now it’s been passed down to me. I walked with the stick for six months when I was an Army officer waiting to get my knee fixed after it snapped. I used it the way it should be used, not just for looks. It’s been through three generations and will be passed on to even more.

6 A STRAPPING BACKPACK

You need money to keep a chateau going, so I did the Dirty Rotten Survival series for the National Geographic Channel in 2015, going through the swamps of Louisiana, looking for gold in Oregon, and being a lumberjack in Washington State. This army-issue Swiss rucksack made with cotton and nettle fibres is nearly 60 years old and was with me the whole way. Before one flight, security searched it – not for the axe, boning and skinning knives inside, but actually because my electric toothbrush had gone off.