Despite having seen a fair amount of the world, I still love travelling - I just have an insatiable curiosity and like looking out of a window.

I mistrust total competence. I've always felt life is a series of small disasters we try to get through.

George Harrison's passing was really sad, but it does make the afterlife seem much more attractive.

I've been lucky to have made a number of travel programmes with the BBC, the object being to see places off the beaten track. As a result, I've often had a guide who's been able to show me things that you wouldn't see with a tour group.

I have been unusually blessed in that I've been allowed to pursue two strands of a career that both delight me and seem to please the public.

I wanted to be an explorer, but gradually found the world had been explored and that there was nowhere left, really. Once they climbed Everest in 1953, when I was 10 years old, I thought, 'Well, that's pretty much it now.' But the idea of travelling and exploring and adventure was very strong.

One of the difficult things of so much travelling is to say goodbye.