Another rail trip with someone who "used to be interesting"

[JoyintheMorning]

More Cheap TV, New this week end; Sandi Toksvig in sunny South of France.
First we had Michael Portillo who got it right. Then we had a narration by Bill Nighy, he didn't go on the journeys, they filmed it and gave him a script to read.
Now we get Sandi's pension top up.
Are there no new ideas anywhere among the Tristrams in the 'meedja'?

What would you like progs about?

I can't watch Sandi Toksvig with her smug, supercilious manner and her headmistress voice. She just epitomises 'entitled' to me (Maybe because her dad was a diplomat who already worked for the BBC).

I did enjoy the Portillo ones - I though he presented it very well.

I won’t watch any celeb travel programmes. It really winds me up they get all this free travel & posh hotels 🤷‍♀️🤣

My impression is that so many people have described Sandi Toksvig to be a national treasure that it is now her firm conviction that she is and that shapes her behaviour

@Charlize43 , I agree about the Michael Portillo journeys, there was a point to them. He was the first and best. the idea is worked out now, we don't need imitators.

I agree - Michael Portillo's travel programmes are really good.

I follow a guy called Steve Marsh on YouTube who does some really interesting travel programs with his partner - they are very low key and unassuming, they travel on a reasonable budget, and go to places that aren't touristy as such. I'd like to see more like that - affordable travel programs by non 'slebs that are pitched somewhere between 'Fee and Jago take a year off from their city jobs to do Asia in his parents' original VW camper' and Jane McDonald goes cruising around the Med.

I can’t watch anything celebrity. Celebrity race of the world, celebrity bake off. I just couldn’t care less about them. Give me real people any day!

Michael Portillo is great because he's an actual train geek and good at communicating his passion. Not just in it for the freebies.

Agree with the Portillo fans.

However, I also recommend Rick Steves on Europe. He's American and I spent a lot of time during the Covid Lockdown enjoying his YouTube programmes. They can be a bit cheesy, but I love the alternative (US) view of the Continent.

Try this link: European Travel Skills Part I

Agree with others on portillo, wouldn't have thought id like them, but he's really good.

Like Simon Reeves also.

At least it's not Italy. How many more programmes can there be sending celebs to Italy? I probably will watch this as want to see where she goes. Cannot bear the hotels one with Giles Coren and Monica Galetti and cannot stand anything with Rob Rinder and Rylan in.

Oh, yes, love Simon Reeves.

Yes @SirChenjins I like him too!

I like some YouTube travel ‘influencers’, but some are as annoying as the celebs!

I like Emma Cruises even though I’m never likely to go on a cruise.

TV is like newspapers, same old people.

I am a women in my late 60’s sadly I love any rail programme blame it on my brothers. Michael Portilo is the best I never thought I would enjoy a Tory politician.

Never heard her described as such. Most people I know find her smug & patronising: If she was a man she'd be the type that would be mansplaining everything to show her superiority.

I know she did a tour called 'National Trevor' implying that she was one. Judi Dench & Maggie Smith are National Treasures, I really don't think Sandi has reached those heights.

I absolutely loved Stanley Tucci's Searching for Italy - Travel / Food show. I liked the way he steps back and lets whoever he is interviewing talk, and his passion for food is genuine and profound.

I really enjoyed Rob and Dylan's ' Passage to India', mainly because it was all about art. It was lovely to see so much beautiful craftsmanship and traditions being handed down through the generations. I also found their friendship and vulnerability endearing to watch. There's a few laugh out loud moments too!

He's great, isn't he? He and Alicja seem genuinely nice people.

I love Sandi Toksvig. She did her first travel-based programme years before Portillo. (Island Race, with John McCarthy, back in 1994.)

I like the dangerous roads show woth celebs as it shows them up quite well. Sue perkins was fab and the bloje she was with was a pillock. Charle something.

The weirdest are when they get celebs be the Everyman character at posh hotels.

“Gor blimey they’ve got chandeliers. Fancy!”

Especially central London hotels they must have been into dozens of times.

Well I don’t have the tiniest clue who most of the “celebrities” are in these programmes anyway, so it’s just like watching the normal version for me!
And at least the money they win goes to charity (mostly)

Michael Portillo's travel programmes are great, never through I'd say that. Whenever he is on, me and a friend text about his sartorial style and colour co-ordination with his outfits.

I usually avoid all the others fronted by "celebs" and I am still foxed by the love for having Susan bloody Calman doing so many travel style programmes. She really gets on my nerves.

I remember the travel programmes with Alan Whicker, what a globetrotter he was. 😂

This was rather Yikes from Whicker, though…

Whicker was usually civil about the younger hands who tried his sort of game, but could be catty when attacked or compared unfavourably with younger professionals. He declined to make Around the World in 80 Days, the series that brought the actor Michael Palin a new career. Afterwards, Palin asked him on camera why he had turned it down. Whicker replied that he wanted to see who the makers would go to when they were scraping the bottom of the barrel. "That will hit the cutting-room floor," laughed Whicker.

No idea why they thing anyone would be interested in seeing others travel on a train.

Clearly some people are or the programmes wouldn’t get recommissioned

Someone in the Guardian described her as a national trinket…