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Untamed and unspoiled, the islands of Papua New Guinea are not your classic beach paradise. But, pristine beaches and world class dive sites, combined with wild jungles and active Zay Harding, East New Britain, Islands volcanoes are an invitation to adventure. Globe Trekker Zay Harding rises to the challenge of a truly unique and unforgettable experience.
In Globe trekker Bangladesh we follow host Holly Morris on an adventure through one of the poorest and most populated countries on the planet. It’s a tough but rewarding journey and Rickshaw, Dhaka contrary to expectations Holly discovers a country overflowing with life, culture and incredible hospitality.
Located at the heart of the Caribbean, Puerto Rico is around 100 miles long by 30 miles wide, with a population of some 4 million. Part of the U.S. Commonwealth, it’s known as the “island of enchantment“, boasting sun-kissed beaches, dramatic mountains, a rich colonial history, and great music.
Starting his journey in Puerto Rico’s vibrant capital, San Juan, host Zay Harding looks around the beautifully preserved old city, dating back to the Spanish conquest in the 16th century.Zay Harding, San Juan Sampling the local cuisine and the fabulous national drink, the piña colada, he salsas the night away before getting to meet the man who rolled the world’s longest cigar.
From San Juan, Zay heads east to El Yunque National Forest, one of the best preserved rainforests in the Caribbean. Home to over 240 species of trees, and a lot of rare wildlife, it’s the last refuge of the endangered Puerto Rican Parrot. Checking out the breeding project that aims to save these beautiful birds, Zay is reassured that the future of the species is in good hands.
From El Yunque, Zay leaves the main island of Puerto Rico to catch a ferry to the small island of Vieques, which is blessed with a spectacular coastline. During WWII, the US military used the island as a weapons test site, and Zay discovers how the island’s glorious beaches are now being decontaminated and opened to public access for the first time since the war.
Zay Harding salsas the night away After enjoying a fabulous horse-ride along the coast of Vieques, Zay takes the ferry back to the main island of Puerto Rico, before heading west to explore the Camuy River Caves National Park. Having eroded through the region’s soft limestone over millions of years to create huge sinkholes and caves, the Camuy is the third largest underground river system in the world. Zay rappels down a 250 foot deep sinkhole, before plunging through the dramatic underground river caverns.
Nearby the Camuy caves, Zay visi
Join Nova Scotia native Zoe D Amato as she travels across Eastern Canada. Starting at Cape Spear, the eastern most point of North America, Zoe's adventure takes her to St. John's, the capital of Newfoundland and Labrador; Halifax, Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, and finally to Toronto, Ontario. She finishes her journey at majestic Niagara Falls.
In this Globe Trekker Special, Ian Wright, Megan McCormick, Matt Young and Zay Harding travel across the Pacific, visiting key Second World War locations in some of the world’s remotest and most beautiful places.
Zay Harding, Bridge Over The River Kwai, Thailand Our journey starts at Pearl Harbour, Hawaii. Megan McCormick attends the Remembrance Day ceremony held each year to honour those who died in the surprise Japanese attack on the United States Pacific fleet on December 7th, 1941.
Within 6 months of Pearl Harbour the Japanese conquered a vast empire across the Pacific and Southeast Asia, and decided they needed to build a new railway line from Thailand to supply their troops in Burma on the front line of their expanding empire. Visiting the famous Bridge Over the River Kwai in Kanchanaburi, Thailand, Zay Harding travels along the line which came to be known as the ‘Death Railway’, as a result of the 12,000 Allied Prisoners of War, and more than 80,000 Asian labourers, who were worked to death building the railway for the Japanese.
In July 1942 the Japanese attacked Port Moresby, the capital of Papua New Guinea, from the north, overland along the rugged and mountainous Kokoda Trail. Matt Young treks through remote Papuan jungle in the footsteps of the Australian troops as they retreated from the Japanese advance, and sees many relics of the battle that have survived undisturbed until today.
WW2 Wreck Diving, Chuuk, Micronesia By the end of 1943, the tide of the war in the Pacific turned, as a result of the United States increasingly superior air and seapower, putting the Japanese onto the defensive. Zay Harding travels to the spectacular volcano-surrounded harbour of Rabaul, in New Britain, Papua New Guinea, home to a massive wartime Japanese naval base which was heavily bombed towards the end of the war. He dives in the harbour, exploring the wreck of a Japanese Zero Fighter Plane discovered just a few months ago.
One thousand miles north o
Presenter Zay Harding makes his way across the urban and rural landscapes of Eastern Texas and he encounters everything from rootin’ tootin’ cowboys, rodeos and oil, to prisons, guns and rockets, and discovers a dramatic and colourful history.
Zay’s journey starts in ‘cow town’, Fort. Worth. Once a major cattle exchange, these days it is a showcase for the spirit of the Texan cowboy.
Zay’s leaps right in, taking some roping lessons from a former rodeo star Pam Minnick and takes part in the evening’s whip-cracking rodeo show. But no cowboy would be complete without his trusty pistol and Ft. Worth is home to the longest running Gun Show in the State.
Having little experience himself Zay explores the show and learns why Texans are so attached to their firearms but none of the answers are as shocking as his encounter with a tazer display!
JFK assasination - DallasOnwards to Dallas, where Zay experiences a darker side to Texan history by visiting arguably the most famous spot in the city: the scene of President Kennedy’s assassination. Zay relives JFK’s final moments with the help of Pearce Allman, a local newsman, who witnessed the tragedy first hand.
No story on East Texas would be complete without mention of that old ‘black gold‘ – Oil! Zay travels to Kilgore, the heart of the East Texas oil boom of the 1930‘s. This small town was once home to the richest acre in the world and helped to create the oil-rich reputation the state enjoys to this day.
Texas also has a long-standing reputation for tough justice. Moving south, Zay stops at one of the most fearsome prisons in the State: Huntsville. Texas executes more people than any other State in the union and all of them occur in the Huntsville State Penitentiary.Texas state penitentiary
Zay explores the sensitive subject by meeting a former warden from the prison’s death house and some newly-released prisoners.
For the final leg of his journey Zay travels to Houston
They say everything is bigger in Texas and nowhere is this more apparent than in the Western half of the State. With its big landscapes, big history and big steaks, West Texas is bursting at the seams with action packed adventure and offers up a colourful mix of the iconic and unexpected.
Fort Worth Cattle Drive In Globe Trekker West Texas presenter Zay Harding begins his journey in the state capital, Austin. With its vibrant music and arts scene, Austin is a shining Mecca for the weird and wonderful and Zay dives right in exploring everything from rattlesnake hotdogs to bingo with chickens.
After a night out soaking up Austin’s wild and crazy music scene Zay heads south to visit the laid back city of San Antonio where he explores the Alamo and gets a lesson in what it really means to be Texan. Our next stop is El Paso,a multi layered city defined by its complex relationship with Mexico colourful, vibrant and oozing with Latino charm. Zay meets the locals and learns about the good, the bad and the ugly sides to life on the border.
Heading into the desert surrounding El Paso, Zay gets a taste of the old Wild West. In a landscape straight out of a John Wayne movie he boards a stagecoach and travels along the old Butterfield trail. It’s a journey back in time, to a place where banditry and Indian raids were common place and beautiful rock formations like Hueco Tanks provided a welcome respite from the punishing travel conditions of the 19th century American West.
For the final leg of his trip Zay takes to the road in a 1960’s mustang and travels to the far north of the state into an area known as the pan-handle. It’s a classic road trip that takes in the stunning Palo Duro Canyon and most of the Texas leg of Route 66. Determined to get his kicks on Route 66, Zay busts a gut in Amarillo’s steak eating challenge, leaves his mark on a bizarre art installation known as Cadillac Ranch and concludes his journey on the border with New Mexico in the
Join Brianna on a whirlwind tour of Britain’s enormous capital city: LONDON! A melting pot of cultures and quirky habits that makes it one of the most unique and thrilling places on the planet. Whether it’s the mockney cheerio chaps and evenin’ guvnor types you’re after in its glorious East End or the altogether calmer atmosphere of meandering canals, we get to the bottom of what makes London so cool!
Beginning our tour at the iconic Buckingham Palace, home to the HRH The Queen of England and various Royals along the way, we see the changing of the guards before heading over to Soho for a spot of afternoon tea above a traditional London pub.
Onwards to the National Gallery, home to over 2,000 paintings and one of Europe’s finest collections of art. For an altogether different view of ‘Art’ our roving host heads over to the East End to sniff out a Banksy, see if the English really DO hanker after the occasional jellied eel and shops for oddities at nearby Spitalfields Market.
Every adventurer needs a hearty breakfast, while others need the occasional splurge so after breakfasting at (arguably) London’s glitziest hotel, The Ritz, Brianna heads into Mayfair for a spot on indulgent retail therapy at the very bastions of English style. Tips from top sommeliers at Berry Bros and Rudd, a fitting at Lock & Co - the oldest hat-makers in London, and more.
No trip to London would be complete without a gander through Covent Garden - and while plenty a fair lady is to be seen the original flower girls have since moved on. Ever wondered why London buses are red? Or who the Fat Controller is? Then take a look inside the London Transport Museum - home to over 370,000 objects concerning urban transport.
Perhaps just as famous for it’s iconic double deckers, as it is for its cyclists, Brianna embraces the British obsession with cycling and and heads along the canal from Regent’s Park all the way to the Olympic Stadium via Camden Lock.
Taking adva
A weekend with a 1950s theme includes stops in Atlantic City and Wildwood, N.J.; Delaware; crabbing on the Chesapeake Bay; the Art Museum in Philadelphia; Flight 93 National Memorial; Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh; and Monticello.
In this Globe Trekker Special, our Globe Trekker hosts explore the world’s most historic sites and empires – travel ling from the heart of Europe, across the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and the Americas, and visiting spectacular sites dating from medieval times to the 19th century.
Via Dolorosa, Jerusalem Exploring great historic sites of The Crusades, Zay Harding visits the Dome on the Rock and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Meanwhile, Holly Morris travels to Syria to check out the mighty Aleppo Citadel and spectacular Krak des Chevaliers fortress.
Built on the back of the Italian city state’s wealth as the most successful trading powers in early medieval Europe, Ian Wright marvels at the Leaning Tower of Pisa, whilst Justine Shapiro explores the Doge’s Palace in Venice.
Following in the footsteps of Venetian merchant Marco Polo’s famous journey to the unknown east, Ian Wright visits remote Karakorum, capital of the Mongol Empire, whilst Megan McCormick enjoys a visit to China’s greatest historic sites, the Great Wall, and the Forbidden City.
Holly Morris, Krak des Chevaliers Back in Europe, Ian Wright checks out the wonders of The Renaissance in Florence, while Estelle Bingham explores the Ottoman Empire’s most historic sites in Istanbul – Aya Sofya, the Blue Mosque, and Topkapi Palace.
England, Portugal, and Spain were the leading European nations during the Age of Discovery. We explore the great sites of Hampton Court Palace, Lisbon docks, and the Moorish Alhambra Fortress in Granada, the conquest of which in 1491 allowed the Spanish to send Columbus on his famous voyage of discovery in 1492.
Megan McCormick visits many of the earliest sites in the New World, Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, the astonishing San Filipe Fort in Cartagena, Colombia, and the Puritans’ first settlement in Plymouth, Massachusetts. From the era of the brutal transatlantic slave trade, Zoe Palmer explores Rodney’s Fort in St.
In this Globe Trekker Special we explore the world’s most historic sites of the modern era. Our hosts travel from the heart of Europe, across the Middle East, South Africa, the Far East, Australasia, and the USA, visiting spectacular sites dating from the mid 19th century right up to the present day.
Eiffel Tower, Paris Exploring the historic sites that shaped the United States, Megan McCormick visits Gettysburg, site of the famous speech given by President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War, Ian Wright travels to the Little Bighorn battlefield in Montana, site of General Custer’s Last Stand during the Indian Wars, while Justine Shapiro visits the gold mining ghost town of Bodie, once part of the great California Gold Rush that brought vast numbers of settlers to the West.
The late 19th century in both the United States and Europe saw revolutionary developments in modern architecture: Justine Shapiro explores the birth of the skyscraper in Chicago, Adela Ucar visits the greatest expression of early steel technology – the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France – whilst Megan McCormick marvels at Europe’s greatest Modernist masterpiece – Antonio Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia church in Barcelona, Spain. Sadly, this golden age of modern European culture was brought to a shuddering end by the outbreak of World War I. Katy Haswell visits Ypres in Belgium, one of the most appallingly bloody of all Great War battlefields, where around half a million soldiers lost their lives.
Megan McCormick, Barcelona After the terrible slaughter of the First World War, the other great upheaval in early 20th century Europe was the Communist Revolution in Russia. Ian Wright travels to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, where the Tsars were overthrown, and to Moscow, to visit Red Square, the Kremlin and Lenin’s Tomb.
Moscow is also home to an extraordinary collection of Communist-era Gothic skyscrapers, but in terms of building skyscrapers as high as possible, the Soviet arc
In this programme host Zay Harding travels to two beautiful archipelagos of isolated islands, one in the Pacific and the other in the Atlantic.
First he explores the very rarely visited Marshall Islands, some of the world’s remotest islands of all, way out in the middle of the vast Pacific ocean.
Subsequently, he heads on to the Atlantic coast of South America, to check out the fascinating former Dutch colonies of Curacao and Bonaire.
Bizarrely, when he first flies in to the Marshall Islands, Zay has to pass through a US military airport on Kwajalein atoll, which is part of a high security ballistic missile test site.
Swiftly ushered off the military base, Zay catches a boat to the adjacent island of Ebeye, to dive the wreck of a WWII battleship that sank here as a result of damaged sustained during the USA’s controversial post-war atomic bomb tests on nearby Bikini atoll.
Attracted by the chance of working at the US military base on Kwajalein, thousands of Marshall Islanders have moved to the tiny island of Ebeye; now hugely overcrowded, it’s been given the unflattering nickname ‘the slum of the Pacific’. Zay watches the local baseball team playing in the only open space on Ebeye big enough for the game – the rubbish dump.
Flying on to Majuro, the capital of the Marshall Islands, Zay visits a project set up to preserve and promote traditional Marshallese canoe-building and navigational skills.
Zay learns how local sailors have the ability to navigate towards far-flung islands by reading signs from the ocean swells. Marshallese sailing canoes are the fastest in the Pacific, and Zay joins in a dramatic impromptu race, battered by fierce Pacific winds.
At Majuro dock, Zay meets up with WWII enthusiast Matt Holly, boarding a dive boat to cross 80 miles of open ocean to the small and extremely remote Mili atoll.
Guns, planes, and other wreckage from the WWII Japanese base on Mili, bombed by the Americans, can still be seen s
In this one-hour Globe Trekker Special to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the series, we go behind the scenes to find out how the world’s longest running and most popular travel series is made.
