Freya Ridings’ beautiful, heartfelt music, gives you a wonderful sense of her warm and open personality and you’re going to LOVE Freya’s stories here on the podcast; Learning to play on her Nana’s piano, growing up in a musical, talented family (her Dad is the voice of Daddy Pig!), Lost Without You being played on Love Island, getting engaged in Lake Como, battling back from Australia before lockdown, struggling to allow herself to travel for fun, but, how the beauty of travel allows for (and I quote) ‘time outside your environment to think new thoughts and have new ideas’. Full of wonderful thoughts, ideas and indeed music for the release of her new album Blood Orange, we are delighted to have Freya Ridings on the podcast. 

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A teenage trip around the galleries of Italy sparked a life-long love for the arts, and as soon as he could Simon Martin, art historian, author and the director of Pallant House Gallery, returned. After a ‘Swallows and Amazons’ childhood he’s studied in the most prestigious institutions in Venice, been knocked out in a train station in Delhi, experienced an inexplicable rush of energy when being touched by the Dalai Lama, curated exhibitions in Japan, explored visual artists’ response to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, enjoyed artistic surprises in Copenhagen, researched and many books and much more. 

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It was a passion for birding and indeed podcasting that lead Suzy Buttress to establish the wonderful Casual Birder podcast, for which she travels extensively, tracing birds and indeed other wildlife around the world. We discuss her recent expedition cruise to the Falklands, South Georgia and Antarctica, dealing with anxiety when having heard two people sadly lost their lives on the same journey, how whale-watching in Baja California brought her to tears, the truly awesome experience of witnessing a solar eclipse in Oregon, feeling the fear and doing it anyway and much more.

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With… Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos in New Zealand, podcaster & author Iszi Lawrence in Australia, charity founder Kevin Chaplin in Cape Town, celebrity vet Marc Abraham building a sand Christmas tree in Thailand, author Hannah Bourne-Taylor rescuing a pangolin in the rainforest in Ghana, Hollywood actor Minnie Driver on beach Christmases in California, comedian & podcaster Cally Beaton ice skating in Central Park, singer-songwriter Nina Nesbitt’s winter wonderland in Iceland, contemporary artist Firouz Farman Farmaian in the family riad in Marrakech, campaigner Jamie Klingler remembering Philadelphia book stores with her mom, Ibizan DJs The Mambo Brothers drinking cold beer on the beach in Rio, Hotelier Marc Rahola on family Christmas in Ibiza, international travel nanny Nanny Sharz in Jamaica, singer-songwriter Foy Vance wishing he’d not gone to Lanzarote, abandoned places explorer ‘Greg Abandoned’ on a Christmas nightclub romance in London and Big Brother star Pete Bennett with a drunk Santa in the Caribbean. What’s not to love??? Happy Christmas from us here at The Big Travel Podcast xx

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Kevin Chaplin left behind his banking career to establish South Africa’s Ubuntu Foundation and rescue the Amy Foundation, named after American student, Amy Biehl, from bankruptcy. Kevin and I talk about growing up under apartheid, the hardship of life in the townships, the challenges faced by Cape Town’s children and young adults, taking a team of young singers to LA, taking a team of young hockey players to Northern Ireland, his book Can Do – Making the Impossible Possible and how the boys who killed Amy Biehl turned their lives around. 

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Author, historian, comedian, podcaster and co-presenter of the travel that doesn’t actually go anywhere – ‘Your Place Or Mine’ with the wonderful Shaun Keavney – Izsi Lawrence is on the Big Travel Podcast. Iszi and Lisa talk… Britain’s most fixable landmarks, The British Museum, Ju Jitsu fighting suffragettes, de-colonising history, dinosaurs, earthworms, the slave trade, Charles Darwin, Bovril, flying solo to AUSTRALIA age 6, the Moroccan side of her family and so much more. 

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Tony Michaelides finds it uncomfortable to call himself legendary, as one would, but he is indeed legendary in the music business…promoting acts including U2, The Stone Roses, David Bowie, New Order, The Police, Depeche Mode, Simply Red, Bob Marley, Massive Attack, REM, Matchbox Twenty, The Pixies, Elvis Costello, Genesis, Johnny Cash, Whitney Houston, Annie Lennox, Tom Petty, Peter Gabriel…and many more. 

Born in Manchester he resolutely made it his mission to promote home grown bands and ended up creating a Sony Award winning music show on Manchester’s biggest commercial station. His book ‘Moments That Rock’ and the podcast of the same name regale some of his brilliant stories and you’re absolutely going to love him on this episode.   

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Instagram Expert, Creative Coach, Photographer and Author Sara Tasker spent lockdown obsessing about the perfect French house and if you follow her on @me_and_orla you know she’s an expert in making things look beautiful. We talk French bakeries, river beaches, Insta retreats, West Yorkshire, how she got into her work, the challenges she faces when travelling as a person with a disability, getting left on a plane due to her wheelchair in airports, growing up with parents that didn’t have passports, childhood holidays to Blackpool Pontins, our mutual embarrassment of ‘second home problems’ and so much more. 

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Cyber Crime Expert, climber and caver Lisa Forte has been voted one of the 100 top women in tech, starting her career plotting against Somalian pirates in the Middle East. Having travelled extensively for both work and fun we talk offending the locals in South Korea, climbing frozen waterfalls in the Alps, scaling skyscraper-height granite in Kazakhstan, spending her 21st birthday on Kilimanjaro, the deeply humble experience of tracing journeys of long-ago Welsh miners deep underground, cyber security, getting attacked by a gang of squirrels and so much more… 

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Singer-songwriter Nina Nesbitt grew up half Swedish and half Scottish in a little Scottish village, kicking off her career age 15 on YouTube before very quickly making a name for herself. Nina talks about touring with Ed Sheeran and Example, overcoming stage fright, fainting in Hong Kong, the confusing familiarity of Australia, a surreal radio tour of the US, deep dish pizzas in Chicago, Philly cheese steaks, having her ex Ed Sheeran write a song about her and going straight to LA after recording this podcast to go on James Corden’s Late Late Show.

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