01x01 - Around the World in 80 Days

[bunniefuu]

MICHAEL: Now, let's have a look.

Let's see what we've got here.

Oh, yes.

MICHAEL (VO): When I was growing
up, I dreamed of travel and adventure.

CROWD CHATTERS

Bye. Thank you!

MICHAEL (VO): Then one
day, that dream came true.

This is it.

I'm standing on
the top of the world!

For three decades, I've been
lucky enough to travel the world

making documentaries
and sharing my adventures

With millions of viewers.

Michael Palin set the tone
for, I think, all travel TV today.

Ooh! Ah...

It's a bit like a very
friendly steamroller.

He came at the right time, he
had the right daring qualities.

DAVID ATTENBOROUGH:
He has huge warmth.

And it's a warmth that spreads
across all kinds of people.

Bye—bye, Suleiman Two.

Bye—bye, Yousef. Bye, Mohammed.

It expanded my little horizons
to the rest of the planet.

MICHAEL (VO): All through
my travels, I kept a diary.

MICHAEL: I've always
felt, when I've travelled

it's really, really
important to keep a record.

I mean, every day is precious.

You're seeing things you'll probably
never, ever see again in your life.

Now, for the first
time, I'm looking back

re-visiting my most
memorable journeys

and opening my diaries to find
forgotten moments from my travels.

My way of looking at each
journey as something different

new, special, exciting

dramatic and challenging

as not really knowing exactly
how it was going to turn out.

"AROUND THE WORLD IN 80
DAYS" INTRO MUSIC PLAYS

I can't deny that I was very,
very excited about traveling.

It was adventure and
it was seeing the world.

All these things I just loved since I
was very young, growing up in Sheffield.

MICHAEL (VO): But before I
was a traveler, I was a Python.

Shaking up comedy, offending
people, and being very silly.

But like all good
things, it came to an end

and it was time to
decide what next.

And then out of the blue comes
this suggestion from the BBC.

PHONE RINGS

Hello?

Yeah.

BBC, yes, I know. Mm—hmm.

You want me to what?

You want me to
go round the world?

Yeah.

But, I mean... Yes, well, I don't see why,
I mean, you go round the world in 36 hours.

Ah, 80?

Eighty days, yes.

One of the things that we felt
we should do at the beginning

was talk to an
experienced traveller

and I emphasised that I
was a novice, I was a learner

so people wouldn't
expect too much from me.

So, who better to go and
see than Alan Whicker?

Alan Whicker did these
big travel programmes

called Whicker's World

which were very much
about him and his journey

quite formal, quite reporter—y.

ALAN: They seem an absolutely
cracking people to me, actually.

Are they what they appear
to be? — MAN: Yes, they are.

All the time? — They're
like that all the time.

They're the kindest, most
happy people I've ever lived with.

They're just fantastic.

How do you cope when
things sort of fall apart

or something completely
unusual happens?

I become tremendously
British, er, erm...

and, er, you must
always speak English.

You mustn't try and
speak the local language

because when the Tonton Macoute
are sticking g*ns into your ribs

you mustn't try and say,
"Please don't" to them

you must say in English,
"Do you mind standing aside?

Excuse me, BBC television, do you
mind? Just back a bit. That's right."

And that's exactly what we did.

And they were absolutely
staggered, and it worked like a dream.

That's the way he travelled.

Uh, in a suit, in a suit and tie

always the rather
detached Englishman

and I, you know, I realised
I couldn't travel like that.

I hadn't got a tie. Well, I
did have a tie, I had one tie.

Right, where are the porters?

The 40 bearers who are
going with us on this trip.

At the very last moment, I
remembered to bring a tie.

You never know, might come in useful
for strangling muggers or whatever.

When I was growing up, I mean,
1950s, no one travelled very far.

You know, Nottingham maybe,
or Leeds, but that was about it.

WHISTLE BLOWS

lBye—bye! — Righty—o. Bye!

Bye—bye, everyone!

BRAKES SCREECH

MICHAEL: So, suddenly,
to find myself being out there

doing things that, you know, would be
so unbelievable when I was growing up

it was so exciting,
and it was so...

liberating.

MICHAEL (VO): The
idea was beautifully simple.

It was a race against the clock.

I would trace the
journey of Phileas Fogg

the hero of Jules Verne's
classic 79th—century novel

across land and sea,
with no planes allowed.

Could I make it round
the world in 80 days?

I saw it as something
almost theatrical, you know?

It was all there in my mind already,
the longest journey of my life.

I don't think anyone had
ever, the BBC ever said

"We're going to go with one traveller
and we're going to spend 80 days with him

and he's going to be watched by
the camera every single moment."

You know, there's hardly
a moment of privacy.

That hadn't been done before.

We were sort of toying with a completely
new way of doing documentaries.

This is on the Espresso
Egitto, which was the ship

from which we went
from Venice to Alexandria.

You know, exotic
part of the journey

but I was clearly at the
beginning of the journey

and I was very unsure of myself.

This is what I wrote.

"Occasionally, the realisation
that this whole project

is supported on my shoulders

demands not just my
survival, but my wit, energy

exuberance and enthusiasm

quite terrifies me.

It's going to be a supreme test

but I'm determined
to pull this off.

Failure is unthinkable."

HE CHUCKLES That used
to keep me awake at night.

Thinking, failure
is unthinkable.

The enormity of the task
itself had me worried...

and it was tied in with how I
was going to present myself.

Could I be funny for 80 more days,
could I be funny for one more day?

And because everyone agreed, well,
it's got to be Palin being spontaneous

no one was going to really step
in and say, "You shouldn't say this.

You shouldn't say that."
That was against the spirit of it

but at the same time, it fed on
a sort of insecurity in my mind.

CAR HORNS HONK — TRAFFIC BLARES

This was arriving at Alexandria.

And it was quite a moment for
me, because it was the first real

sort of moment of foreignness.

Up till that point, I was
within a European perspective.

Suddenly I'm in an
African perspective.

CAR HORNS HONK

It was a world you
didn't know at all.

Suddenly being
somewhere foreign, strange

really different,
everything felt different.

The heat, the
smells, the sounds.

You can't relate to it in your
English way, particularly.

You certainly can't
be all colonial about it

and saying, "Come
on, excuse me!"

You've just got to go with it, and I
realised I was quite excited by that.

That was where the
fun began, I thought.

MICHAEL (VO): As well as keeping
a diary, I also carried a tape recorder.

And although I kept the tapes,
I've hardly ever listened to them.

Until now.

MICHAEL ON TAPE: Now
proceeding at a manic gallop on the old...

horse—drawn carriage.
— HOOVES CLATTER

It is just extraordinary.

Lots of little
individual enterprises.

The... untidiness, really.

I suppose if I were on my
own, I'd be pretty scared.

TAPE STOPS

Says it all,
really, it sort of...

just spills all around
you, all these...

all these different sensations

and the fact that everyone
seems to be mad. HE LAUGHS

Mad but happy, I
would have to say.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: I finally
reach the handsome station

resolved to shed some English
inhibitions, and become a part of Africa.

CROWD CHATTERS —
INDISTINCT ANNOUNCEMENT

My first experience of fending for
myself in a very difficult environment

which I knew very little about.

There were no sort of English lettering,
English signs or anything like that.

"Just go in there, Michael,
ask for a train ticket to Cairo"

and honestly, at this point, I just didn't
quite know what I was supposed to do.

Cairo?

Cairo?

INDISTINCT CHATTER

Goes to Cairo?

Cairo?

Cairo?

Cairo? OK, here we go.

Right.

Palin, look at you!
You look like a child.

Look at your boyish looks.

That's what they always say
about Palin, his boyish good looks.

MAN SPEAKS ARABIC — One?

One? — Yes, one—way to Cairo.

MAN SPEAKS ARABIC

It's real life, it's happening

it's not scripted,
they're not all extras

they are... It's reality.

And we're seeing a little
moment of it, we're seeing a little...

a little fragment of existence,
in that train station at that time.

I love it.

Cairo? — Yes.

Today? — Yes.

CROWD CHATTERS —
INDISTINCT ANNOUNCEMENT

Go there?

Ah! I've just come from there.

I shall walk to
Cairo at this rate.

This is even cleverer
than I thought.

That it was actually
unrehearsed.

I mean, he turns up at
a ticket booth, and says

"I want to go to somewhere or
other," and it's a real exchange

and if there's a confusion
about understanding one another

there's confusion about
understanding, which is how it is.

I personally think that one
of the reasons viewers like

telly travel programmes

is that they are quite hard
to script and over—produce.

The very nature of going on a
journey where serious travel is involved

means stuff is gonna go wrong

people are gonna appear
who you weren't expecting

and there's gonna be spontaneity,
and I think people enjoy that.

They like the sense that
this isn't running on rails

and somebody's feeding
lines through an earpiece

and certainly watching
Around The World

you had that... You had
that sense that these...

perhaps this entire team don't
entirely know what they're doing

but focussing on Michael
in front of the camera

clearly the bloke hasn't
got a clue, and that's great!

That's fun for us

and you can see he's open to the
experiences he's having, as well.

MICHAEL: The Englishman
trying to make sense of it all

hanging on to his Englishness, "But
surely they shouldn't have done that

people shouldn't shout on stations,
they shouldn't argue in public"

and all that sort of thing,
but that's what they do.

It happens all the time.

Hello!

I saw you before,
you're trouble.

Cairo?

After buying the ticket, I just
thought, "This is hopeless.

I'm going to look
completely incompetent."

In the end, it was this
sort of incompetence

which people quite enjoyed.

They sort of felt comfortable
with that, like, you know

"Well, we'd have been
in the same situation

if we'd had to buy a ticket at Alexandria
and we didn't know any Arabic."

TRAIN HORN BLARES

ADE: The thing about
when you have had a career

and you're moving
into something new

is you're almost like a baby

because everything
is fresh and new again

and you could see that.

The thing that makes it special is
when you have hardened travellers

that kind of newness, that
sense of excitement is gone

you know, but it was
there with Michael

and people connect to that.

TRAIN HORN BLARES

CAR HORNS HONK

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: Back
across the Nile to the city centre

to search out a
room for the night.

Eschewing the Hiltons
and the InterContinentals

I plump for the classy ring of
something older and more dignified.

JOANNA: When Michael
surfed into the travel shows

we knew it was
going to be different.

We knew it would be quite, what we
call in the business, roughty—toughty

not all smart hotels
and lovely clothes.

It would be a real
travellers' piece of work.

PIPE JUDDERS

MICHAEL ON TAPE:
There is no hot water.

There is no stopper on the bath

even if there were hot water

and the fact that so
many fittings don't work

add to the sort of
magical anarchy of Cairo.

Mm. Gosh.

I know that's something
of a romantic notion.

But it is just how you
have to approach the place.

It's good to hear that,
actually, "magical anarchy"

and things like that, that
I've said, are probably

exactly what I felt,
and I feel a slight regret

that I've never felt
quite like that again

because the next time you
go somewhere, it just is less...

of a surprise, and
this was just boom!

And a real as*ault
on the senses.

Unfortunately, we
were going rather slowly.

It got rather late, and things
really began to fall apart.

MAN : Allahu Akbar.

INDISTINCT CHATTER

MICHAEL (VO): First, we missed the ship
that was meant to take us on to wards Muscat

then forced to travel overland

we hit a snag in Saudi Arabia.

The situation is this, it's gonna
put us at least four days late

if I catch a boat
round to Dubai.

That's the quickest
we can do it. However...

I thought we were scuppered,
but at 3:30am this morning

the Saudi Minister of
Information came up with this letter

which gives me permission to
travel right across Saudi Arabia

as far as Dubai overland.

However, it only extends to me.

It doesn't include you lads,
as well. Sorry about that, but...

tis the way it goes, and at
least it gets me as far as Dubai

then maybe we'll catch up
some time on the dhow, so

this is it, lads.

See you in Dubai in two days.

Sorry about that! You'll
get a lift, pretty boys like you.

MAN: Drive carefully, Michael.

Yeah, bye!

Bye, good luck.

MAN: Pretty boys like us...

I did feel, on this journey,
that anything could happen

and you had to be
able to deal with it.

At the same time,
there was a part of me

that really wanted to get
this done in less than 80 days.

From Saudi Arabia
onwards, began to lose days

four days behind.

So, it was a
combination of frustration

because I wanted to get
the thing done properly

but exhilaration that we
were having, you know...

These weird and wonderful
things were happening.

There are times when everything
seems to go wrong when you're travelling

and you just think

"Oh my gosh, what
am I gonna do?"

and there's this
intense frustration.

What was lovely about
that moment was that he...

he showed that frustration,
he was like, "Urgh!"

But, um...

but you find a way
round, and he did.

He found a new way, a new route

and that was just
brilliant and just lovely.

He just kept on going.

MICHAEL (VO): Today, Dubai
resembles a space—age city of the future.

When I got there, it was still a
working port on the Persian Gulf

and I needed a lift.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: That I'd arrived
in Dubai at all was a small triumph

and I'm even more cheered
when I look out next morning

onto a most
promising waterfront.

And at last, my
first sight of a dhow.

Preceded by the provisions

I board our dhow, Al—Shama

which means
"candlelight", in Arabic.

No one really spoke English, but the
captain spoke a few words of English.

The other 17 members of
the crew and our own crew

had to sleep there on that
deck, on those sacks and all that.

There was no cabins or anything.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO:
It's all very strange.

We're setting off for six
days on the high seas

out of radio contact

on a boat with not
a lifebelt in sight.

We're heading out
into the Persian Gulf

where nine years of w*r
are just coming to an end.

MICHAEL: Nothing like
this had been done before

which made the whole thing...

quite sort of alarming, but
also exciting at the same time.

You were sort of making up
the rules as you went along.

ED: This is a totally
beautiful piece of television.

There's nothing rigged or
contrived or organised about this.

They are just out in the
middle of the ocean for days

with people who have done
this journey, just like this

every day for centuries,
for generations

and so we're getting an insight
into the reality of how these guys live

in a way that...

television finds... Would
have found so hard to show

until Michael Palin and these guys
decided to do six days on a dhow.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO:
The plumbing is basic.

They favour the hole
in the barrel system.

But using it is nowhere near
as alarming as getting to it.

The approach is
scorchingly hot by day

and suicidal at night

but once installed, one enjoys
direct contact with nature.

This is rather a shock

and causes my bowels
to lock solid for three days.

ADE: Oh, I remember this!

Yeah, I think it's kind of a
reoccurring theme with Michael

when he goes on boats,
he talks about his bowels

and how they get locked solid.

That's another thing
you never talk about

but travellers only talk about your
bowels, "What's the water like?"

You know, "Oh, I had the runs, I
was constipated. I had this, that."

It becomes something that you
don't... you don't get shy about.

It's terribly important.

I think the British public know
more about Michael's bowels

than his GP or his doctors.

I'm telling you, we all
know that his bowels

are probably a national
treasure. HE LAUGHS

I've been on squatters, my
God, hanging out over precipices.

You've got to face
up to grim—ish things.

You've got to know that maybe
you won't be able to shave.

You've got to know that sometimes
you're not seen in your best light

as it were, and you
always want to...

Even if you're a
clown, which he is

an entertainer
and not a vain man

which he's not remotely

you kind of want to look good
onscreen, and sometimes you can't.

H E G ROANS

Oh!

This is not for
prime—time television.

Ah.

This is for indigestion,
I hope he knows.

Short walk on the...

MICHAEL GROANS ...Englishman.

MICHAEL GRUNTS Ah!

Being ill, and suddenly

old Kasim comes
and walks all over me.

HE SIGHS

MICHAEL (VO): This was a time
before technology took over our lives.

The dhow had no
sat—nav, no wi—fi, no phone

and the crew
navigated by sextant.

I felt a great curiosity
about the people I was with.

I wanted to get things
on a personal level

and that's where the dhow
really worked, it had to be personal

because there was no way of us
getting away from anybody else.

MEN CHATTER AND CHUCKLE

SIMON: There was one moment in particular
that really stuck with me at the time

where he sat on this old dhow

with an older bloke

and Michael was listening
to this old Walkman

which, for anyone who's
significantly younger than me

was our early MP3 player type...
It played something called a tape

and you had to press a button

and you had these headphones
that went over your head.

Now, you put them on like that.

OK?

How's that, Kasim, alright?

Now, prepare yourself for
a bit of Bruce Springsteen.

This may have
very serious effect

but tell me to stop if
you don't like it, alright?

You like it?

Good beat?

MUSIC PLAYS FAI NTLY

This must be one of
the oddest audiences

for The Wild, The Innocent and
the E Street Shuffle ever recorded.

It's good, isn't it?

MICHAEL CHUCKLES

SAILOR CHATTERS IN ARABIC

It was just brilliant
and beautiful

and honestly, it was
a bit of a revelation.

It was a... "Oh, my goodness!

They're just like us, these
strange foreign people!"

And that was a big difference,
on telly, to what had gone before.

MICHAEL: It was supposed to be
a five, ten—minute sequence at most

and it was the... the editor
who looked at all this and said

"I think it'll work
better at 55 minutes"

and so the dhow became
a complete episode.

SAI LORS SING RHYTHMICALLY

THEY CONTINUE
SINGING RHYTHMICALLY

MICHAEL: "The
grey mist is lifting

and revealing the
Gateway of India.

So, the time comes to say goodbye
to the people in whose hands

we've entrusted our
lives for the last week."

Bye—bye, Suleiman.

Bye—bye, Suleiman Two.

Bye—bye, Yousef. Bye, Mohammed.

Bye. — Bye!

Bye—bye, Arun.

Bye—bye, Yaqub.

Bye—bye, Kazmir. Oh!

Oh! — SAILORS LAUGH

Oh, look at that, look at that!

Oh, thanks very much.

Very nice people,
very good crew.

I'll always sail
with you, thank you.

Oh, well, here we go.

It's about these people he
meets and those little moments

those little sparks
of interaction

that are the
purest joy of travel

and he shows us that,
and he... he relates it to us

and we have it, we keep
it ourselves a little bit

we benefit from
his little encounters.

CAR HORNS HONK

MICHAEL: In India,
there's so much going on

and so much to sort of take in.

This busy, seething city

in the middle of this
busy, seething country.

There was an awful lot
happening on the street

and we had to make sense of
it and make our way through it.

CROWD CHATTERS

We were then going to
be staying at the Taj Hotel

so, I went from seven
days on the dhow

to this very
expensive, posh hotel.

I was almost
disgusted by what I saw.

I could see people
sort of, you know

shouting at porters
and things like that

and being very overbearing,
and just pointing at things

demanding things be done.

But it was a very
powerful feeling

when I got to the Taj, it was
like I was sort of distanced from it

like I'd come from
another planet

to see just how people behaved in
what we would call our familiar world.

Ah!

"Bombay is the most
difficult place to film yet."

CHILDREN CHATTER

"The people who stare at the
camera, the dripping humidity

the extraordinary locations."

VENDOR CHATTERS

"Watching a mongoose driven
to draw blood from a snake..."

VENDOR CHATTERS

"...in amongst grinding poverty.

It's wearing us all down."

I don't remember that, I...

You know, I look back on
those journeys and think

"We all had such a wonderful
time," but of course you didn't.

You know, you had
doubts, you had worries.

You got very tired, and of course,
filming in Bombay, it looks terrific

uh, in the end, but
actually, working through it

was pretty tough.

HORNS HONK

MICHAEL ON TAPE: Dadar Station.

Twenty minutes before
departure of the Madras Express.

No one seems to
know what they're doing.

People are being got in and out,
scrambling about, changing places.

Is this a permanent
state of affairs?

I do notice on the book stall

there's a copy of Jeffrey
Archer and a copy of Spycatcher

in the middle of all this.

MICHAEL: Yes, we
weren't there for long.

Not just about destinations, we've
got to remember that the whole thing

is a journey which has to
be done in under 80 days.

TRAIN CHUGS

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: Are you
travelling all the way to Madras?

Yes, from Bombay
to Madras. — Ah.

What will the, erm...
what will the south be like?

I've never been there before.
— It's like another country.

SIMON: Of course, the programmes
are about Michael and his journey

of course they are, but
also I think, fundamentally

they're about the
people he meets

and I think that's been one of
the great endearing, enduring

successes of his adventures.

INDISTINCT CHATTER

MICHAEL: The Indians,
they're very friendly people.

It was quite nice working there.

They were very involved
in what we were doing

and very... interested

and genuinely felt that they could
show us a better way of doing it.

TRAIN HORN BLARES

MICHAEL ON TAPE: Rather
beautiful views down now to our right.

Fields, trees,
stretches of water.

Now a party of
children walking, um...

along the downline, now.

Little kids with
their plastic bags.

Striding off very purposefully.

Looks idyllic out
there, really, for them.

It's the sort of thing that...

never loses its appeal.

So, completely emotional
and nostalgic, I know.

There we are, you
see, as I'm rambling on

expressing what is essentially
the heroic nature of train travel

which, from very early
on, when I was very young

there was something
heroic about trains.

Just went through the
cities and through the country

and at a sublime confidence.

I would be happy to
watch Michael Palin

look out the window
of a train for an hour.

Like, I'm... I don't
know what it is!

He always looks so centred.

There's always such hustle and
bustle as he's trying to get on them

and there's always
this missed connection

there's always, "Will we
make the boat?" It's just...

You can feel him breathe,
and you breathe with him.

You kind of go, "Here we
go. We're making up time now.

We're going and we can watch..."

I mean, it's a great
way to see a country.

There's a lot of little boy in
the whole enterprise, really

in all the travels.

I think when I've lost the
little boy sense of wonder, it's...

I've lost something
quite significant.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: This magical
train ride will be my last overland journey

for quite a few days.

From Madras, I caught
a cargo ship to Singapore

and then a container
ship on to Hong Kong

a new continent and a new
culture to try and get to grips with.

Good morning, Mr Palin.

Welcome to Hong Kong,
sir. — Thank you very much.

METAL CLANGS

MICHAEL (VO): But in some
ways, Hong Kong was just a prelude

to the most exciting
stage of the journey yet

Communist China itself

China and Saudi Arabia, the
only two countries on the journey

where you had that
extra element of fear

of offending some authority

so, everything was potentially

much more loaded
going into China.

MICHAEL ON TAPE: Now,
outside the window is China

my first glimpse of China.

It's, erm... it's different
from Hong Kong

because on the shoreline

there are a lot of
small, thatched huts

standing in the water, I
suppose they're fisherman's huts.

A lot of small fishing boats.

Um, but it's a very broad...

grey—green estuary here.

There was a frisson,
going to China

because it was a communist
country, and communism then

was still a very sort of potent,
threatening image for Westerners

and it was not long after
the Mao Tse—tung era

people being forced to go
off to the fields and all that

so, I didn't quite know
what I was going to find.

I was enjoying
being far from home.

This is what I wanted to
travel for, I wanted to find places

that were very different,
not similar to home.

Sometimes I see the
programme of BBC

in our television. — Yes?

And sometimes, I
listen, I listen to the radio.

Ah! — BBC in shortwave.

Shortwave, shortwave. —
Yes. Shortwave, that's right.

SIMON: Look at the clothing
there, look at what they're wearing!

I mean, he's travelling at such
a fascinating time of change.

They're all in flipping
Gucci and Levi's now.

That's what so cool about it.

It kind of feels like you're
being let into a world that...

that's been forbidden.

MICHAEL ON VIDEO: Shanghai
is the largest city of China

with a population of
more than 12 million.

Though the street
atmosphere feels medieval

there's a definite
trickle of modern goods.

You can buy an
electronic calculator

but the price will still be
added up on an abacus.

What I realised, as
we went through China

was that the Chinese
were very, very preoccupied

with their own lives

and this enormous transition

from being a sort of
agricultural peasant economy

to an economy where
big cities were growing

buildings were
going up all the time.

So, something was going on in China
that preoccupied the Chinese completely

and that was the
feeling in China

that there were a lot of things you
didn't know and you couldn't know

and they didn't want you to know,
and there was no way of finding out.

It wasn't sort of evident in...

in sense of a sort of
obvious oppression

people with g*ns, pushing
people around and all that.

But there was a kind
of acceptance that

um, this was a huge,
potentially very powerful country

run by a sort of
totalitarian government.

TRAIN HORN BLARES

ANNOUNCEMENT IN MANDARIN

MICHAEL: On the train, on the other
hand, there were one or two people to meet.

Trains are always good
because every sort of

estate of man or woman is...

uses trains, you know, from
the richest to the poorest.

Do you, er, carry an
umbrella with you every day?

HE LAUGHS

Is that true or not?

No. — No?

If I... If I set out of the
house with an umbrella

I'd lose it within a
day, anyway. No, no.

No, no, no. — No, I
don't, I just get wet.

Oh, just get wet. OK.

You get the impression,
"Oh, he just met that person

and it's rather a surprise to him and
the cameraman and everybody else

that they should actually have
a conversation and share a joke.

MICHAEL (VO): Leaving, I felt
we were on the home straight

even though we were still two
oceans and a continent away

from completing the circle.

From Japan, we
sailed to California

a ten—day voyage that
gave me time to reflect

on everything I'd
seen and experienced.

Then, after one last epic train
journey right across America

we finally set sail for England.

"I lie in bed this morning

and seriously consider what it
would be like to be back home.

I think that the journey has, in
a way, calmed and settled me.

It's been much nearer to
sanity than the phone—ringing

celebrity—conscious
world I left at home.

At sea, the pace of life
slows to a very agreeable level

and the thought of a return
to city life is not, this morning

as tempting as I
expected it to be.

In fact...

I could easily go round again."

There we are, packing
up my bag for the last time

on board the Danish
ship, the Leda Maersk

that had taken us from
New York to Felixstowe

and look, I'm looking
tired, let's face it.

AIR HISSES

It's been a long, long journey.
I've been on camera for...

HE LAUGHS 79 days.

Look at that, there's a
man who's knackered.

Absolutely knackered,
no acting required.

I want to get home, want to
have a beer, I want to get to bed.

We finally get to
the Reform Club.

And, you know,
this is wonderful.

We've done it in 79
days, seven hours.

We go up the steps

and one more indignity
ready to be heaped upon us.

Well, there we are,
this is the Reform Club.

This is where Phileas
Fogg started his journey.

This is where I began my journey

on September 25th 1988,
79 days and seven hours ago.

Unfortunately, for
reasons of their own

the Club do not want me to go
in there and film this afternoon

so, I have to say, this
is the end of the journey

on the pavement outside
104 Pall Mall, that's it.

MICHAEL: British Clubs, you
know, it's not about letting people in

it's about keeping people out.

So, I learnt a few lessons
about the English that day

which left me very
depressed for about a week.

HE CHUCKLES

MICHAEL (VO): Still, I was
home, reunited with my family

back in my old life

and anxiously waiting
for the moment of truth.

What would the viewers make
of my journey around the world?

JAYNE IRVING: And we're here to take your
calls on anything to do with television.

Let's have a look at what
you've been calling about already

in our Open Line.

PHONES DIAL AND RING

WOMAN: Regarding
Around the World in 80 Days

I have never enjoyed
a programme so much.

He has taken me to... personally,
to places I'd never seen.

So many of you have phoned in
about this programme last night

er, David Templeman
from Camberley.

"Congratulations, this is
what television is all about."

MICHAEL: The fact that
it rated so highly was...

a surprise, in a way, because there
hadn't been anything like that before

which was quite so
sort of spontaneous

improvised, unplanned.

JOANNA: It was game—changing.

It's changed travel...
travel programmes forever.

SIMON: Total beautiful
melting mix of cultures

and just humanity shared.

MICHAEL: I learnt
that my desire to travel

my love of travel
wasn't something false

wasn't something
I had romanticised.

It was very real.

I didn't really ever expect it to
unleash all the other programmes

or the freedom to
do other programmes.

This is it. I'm standing
on the top of the world!

Pole to Pole, this was
a greater challenge.

You know, countries
that I'd never been to.

The USSR...

and all the way through Africa.

Then to Antarctica itself.

Thrilling stuff.