I am not a great cook, I am not a great artist, but I love art, and I love food, so I am the perfect traveller.

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.

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.

You don't ask people about the immigration policies of the U.K. or their country's agricultural policy. Instead, you talk to them about the meal they're eating or their family, and from that you get the sense of another human being, someone we can all relate to.

There is barely a country in the world where you will be completely safe.

I'd got over playing a character. People accepted who I was, and if I was incompetent and useless, they felt quite endeared to me.

Armageddon is not around the corner. This is only what the people of violence want us to believe. The complexity and diversity of the world is the hope for the future.