101. Iain Dale; Communist Russia, Italian Coach Trips, the SAS in Beirut and the Decline of Social Discourse
Release Date: 07/28/2020
125. Christmas Special 2021; Sathnam Sanghera, Lisa Jewell, Matt Forde, Anne Sebba, Olly Mann, Greenham Common and more
The Big Travel Podcast
Authors Anne Sebba on the Royal abdication, Sathnam Sanghera's dismal Christmas restaurant, Lisa Jewell's Boney M in Barbados, adventurer Jamie Douglas-Hamilton rowing to the Antarctic, satirist Matt Forde in an NYC Irish bar, podcaster Olly Mann’s disappointing LA Santa, artist Firouz FarmanFarmaian Muslim Catholic Christmas in Marrakesh, adventurer Sam McManus's ancient Spanish fiesta, Festival promoter Huw Win's Thai rainforest & Nobel Peace Prize winner Rebecca Johnson's Christmas at Greenham Common.
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124. Firouz FarmanFarmaian; Escaping Tehran, Kashmiri Houseboats, Trekking Kyrgyzstan, Rock Bands and Contemporary Art
The Big Travel Podcast
Born in Tehran, the descendent of a nomadic tribe, Contemporary Artist Firouz FarmanFarmaian's family scattered after the Islamic Revolution. He grew up trekking mountains and deserts, touring with his Indie rock band and now with his internationally acclaimed art. With a gallery in Tarifa, Spain, and a new base in Athens, he travels the globe sourcing ideas and materials with craftswomen in remote regions and will be representing Kyrgyzstan at the Venice Biennale with the exhibition Gates of Turan.
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123. On Location in Marbella Old Town with Tour Guide Javier Gonzalez
The Big Travel Podcast
A journey through the maze of Marbella's 16th Century cobbled lanes surrounding the old 'Orange Square', encountering flamenco singers and opera stars and sampling some of the coast's most wonderful tapas. With tour guide Javier Gonzalez and staying at the stunning Anantara Villa Padierna Palace, with its classical Italian design and sophisticated yet arty vibe.
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122. Matt Forde; Billy Connolly in New York, Liam Gallagher in Berlin and Nick Leeson's Worldwide 'British Scandal' Jaunt
The Big Travel Podcast
Comedian, political satirist and Spitting Image star Matt Forde talks accosting Billy Connolly in New York, 'dying' on stage in Luxemborg, pints of Carling in ex-pat clubs in Bahrain, Nick Leeson's luxury hotel dash around the world, spending 3 months locked in a first floor flat, an emotional pilgrimage to the Ghostbusters fire station, being the voice of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump (yes he does give us some excellent impressions) and posh people behaving badly on the podcast British Scandal.
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121. Sam McManus; Adventure Travel When the World Closes, Costa Rica, Green Northern Spain and the Unexpected Pull of Home
The Big Travel Podcast
Just as the world was closing Sam McManus from YellowWood Adventures took a daunting gamble and hopped on a plane to Costa Rica. We talk about how the pandemic can change travel (even for the better), tourism being potentially a means for good, eco-tourism and re-forestation, surfing, small pueblos in the green hills of Northern Spain, his wonderful travelogue about his explorations - Wax and Gold Journeys in Ethiopia & Other Roads Less Travelled - and feeling the pull of friends, family and home.
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120. UK TRAVEL UPDATE; Travel Opens Up, Vaccines, Quarantine and a Call to Action to The Government
The Big Travel Podcast
Good news at least for those people who have had two UK administered vaccines. From 19th July we can now go to amber list countries without quarantining on return. BUT at the moment this is just for UK administered vaccines meaning the country is not yet open to inbound tourism. Travel needs to be two-way! We need people in the UK to support our business too. Whilst we are aware it needs to be done safely we also need to get aviation and travel moving even further.
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119. UK TRAVEL UPDATE; New Rules, Traffic Lights, Vaccinations
The Big Travel Podcast
A Big Travel Podcast special on the latest UK Travel Update; the new rules, the changes in the traffic light ratings, vaccinations soon to be taken into account and much more. A ten minute episode of essential listening.
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118. Olly Mann; Guns On Trucks in Malawi, Swim-Up Bar Piña Coladas, Greyhounds and The American Dream
The Big Travel Podcast
Olly Mann, from Answer Me This podcast fame, his new The Retrospectors and much more, loves nothing more than researching trivia especially with travel. We talk Wrigley’s chewing gum and decapitation, leaving your baby outside a pub, people who get erections on public transport, a love for Luton Airport, the misleading American Dream, cocktails worth shortening your life for, having a bottom accident on an African roadside (yes this episode does feature the S word) and much more.
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117. Huw Wyn; Arabian Nights in Cairo, Hitching Through Nepal, Tibetan Medicine in Scotland and Tom Hardy Dropping into his Festival
The Big Travel Podcast
Into The Wild Festival promoter Huw Wyn grew up in his mother’s hotel in Wales then moved to Spain. We talk growing up feral in Andalucia, hitchhiking across Europe, fish-packing in the Netherlands, Glastonbury, Arabian Nights in Cairo, the poetic side of being a London bin man, orphanages in India, Mother Theresa in Calcutta, meeting the Dalai Lama, studying Tibetan medicine in Scotland, the remote Buddhist kingdom in Ladakh, hitching 2000 miles through Nepal, Tom Hardy at his festival and much
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116. Anne Sebba; Parisian Women and Nazis, Film Stars in Rome, ‘Communists’ in Sing Sing Prison
The Big Travel Podcast
The author of one of Lisa’s favourite books, Les Parisiennes: How the Women of Paris Lived, Loved and Died in the 1940s, Anne Sebba explores the lives of women ‘writers and fighters’. As a journalist and author she's worked in film-star-filled 70s Rome, moved to New York with a baby, camped in the Mexico desert with Wallis Simpson’s free-diving step-son, had her camera film thrown into the Ganges while tracing Mother Theresa and, for her most recent book on Ethel Rosenburg, to Belarus and Sing Sing
info_outlineA school trip to Communist Russia left LBC’s Iain Dale hooked on travel. He’s since learned fluent German, been chased to the Austrian border by a Hungarian prostitute, been guarded at gun-point in Lebanon, done things he doesn’t feel he can tell us in a Miami Hotel and, as one of the UK’s foremost political commentators, feels Washington DC is almost an ancestral home. A sharply humorous insight into the world we live, angry tweeters, anonymous trolls, the importance of languages and why we can’t just all get along.
On this episode we cover:
His new book Why Can’t We All Just Get Along; Shout Less, Listen More
The decline of social discourse
Online anonymity leading to unnecessary aggression
Angry tweeters and anxiety
Unfollowing Owen Jones due to the abuse he gets
Lisa wanting to give Owen Jones a cuddle
The need to understand people who have differing point of views
The people being frustrated with politicians
The virtual disappearance of deference
Twitter being addictive but sometimes a nasty place
Online abuse upsetting even the toughest of skinned
The need to have a decent debate from both sides of an argument
Being The Big Travel Podcast’s most organised ever guest
Growing up on a farm
Only having one family holiday as a child
His husband hating holidays!
Coming back 3 days early from Cape Cod
Being on the same flight as was later involved in 9/11
How the homebodies have done better out of lockdown
Not going out for over 100 days due to shielding!
His side-line selling political mugs
Being like a convent school girl released after lockdown!
Lisa drinking out of a talkSPORT mug
Lisa and Ian Collins on talkSPORT
The teacher who took the school to communist Russia
The overnight train to Moscow
Almost preferring Russia under communism
The ‘sliding doors’ trips to Germany that completely changing his outlook
Being the first person in his family to go university
Does university give you an edge in critical thinking?
The University of Easy Access
His farming parents backing his non-farming ambitions
Being ‘totally useless at sciences’
The book Travellers in the Third Reich being an excellent account of Germany in between the wars
How learning languages changes the mind-set
The optimum age to learn a new language
Arabic, Mandarin, Spanish all should be taught in schools
An unlikely 1980 Cosmos coach trip to Italy
Venice, Florence, Rome, Capris
Being 6ft 2 meaning
Doing the For The Many podcast with Jacqui Smith
Being surrounded by gun toting Lebanese soldiers in Beirut
The rather frightening entry to Lebanon with the SAS
Being the first British person in Beirut since John McCarthy visited
Don’t go anywhere without the SAS
Dom Joly talking about Lebanon on The Big Travel Podcast
A road trip to Vienna
Stumbling into communist Hungary
Heading to Budapest before the first McDonalds got there
Being cashed out of town by a Hungarian prostitute
Lisa’s strange night of avant garde jazz in Budapest
Going to both Azerbaijan and Armenia when they hate each other
Tourism police in Cuba
Outrageous antics at a gay hotel in the Florida Keys
Apparently gay man can have right-wing views – who knew!
Being hapless in airports
Getting to airports 5 hours (!) before the flight
His nieces calling him Uncle Herod
Feeling Washington DC is almost an ancestral home
Attending Trump’s inauguration
Staying in the best hotel in Uganda…
…while David Cameron (then Prime Minister) stayed in a shack
Being a Tory candidate in 2004
People in Cromer in Norfolk staring at a black man
Lisa’s terribly embarrassing story on the night of the Brexit night vote (tempting to edit it out but I left it in!)
Cliff Richard’s Miss You Nights in crocodile country in the deep Australian outback, hundreds of miles from anywhere