Oh What A Time... - #126 Journeys and Adventure (Part 1)

Episode Date: July 20, 2025

**PLEASE NOTE: This episode was recorded just before Leslie Lemon - the custard-loving WW2 hero that so many listeners emailed us about - died at the age of 106 years old, last week. In tribute to the great man, we’ve left in our celebration of his custard-guzzling ways.**This week we’re hitting the road and exploring the incredible travels of the likes of Eva Dickson, we’ll be getting in a canoe across Belgium with Robert Louis Stevenson and we’ll head to the Pacific Ocean with Meriweather Lewis.Elsewhere, what on earth did writers do before google docs? Meet up in person? Imagine! If you’ve got anything on this or custard or anything else, you can email us: [e-mail] you fancy a bunch of OWAT content you’ve never heard before, why not treat yourself and become an Oh What A Time: FULL TIMER?Up for grabs is:- two bonus episodes every month!- ad-free listening- episodes a week ahead of everyone else- And much moreSubscriptions are available via AnotherSlice and Wondery +. For all the links head to: ohwhatatime.comYou can also follow us on: X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepodAnd Instagram at @ohwhatatimepodAaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice?Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk).Chris, Elis and Tom xSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to episodes of Oh What A Time early and ad free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Keep people and pets safer. Always keep your dog on a leash in public. Learn more at toronto.ca slash leash your dog. A message from the city of Toronto. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle Three. Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible original series.

When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the Grandview shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in the supernatural thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Hello and welcome to another time in the history podcast that asks how on earth did any scripts that were written collaboratively get done prior to the invention of Google Docs?

How on earth did it happen? And also prior to word? Can you imagine Tom? I mean, this is your job. I've done quite a lot of it, but Writing on a typewriter script. Yeah, every time you make a mistake. I mean get the teabags out Horrible and Writing with another person Like have you both got typewriters? How does it work? And if you haven't got a typewriter, you can't see what's going on unless you're sitting directly next to the person or behind them. So I just don't understand. Like all the classic double

act writers writing in partnerships like Galtman and Simpson, for instance, imagine what they'd have produced if they'd had Google Docs! Absolutely! Imagine how much... The two Ronnies would have been so much better. It'd have been 150 series! They could have done 50 Christmas specials a year! One a week! It blows my mind that they were constantly having to meet in person.

As soon as Henry Packer and I realised that final draft you could click something called Collaborate and see the same thing on the same screen. We basically never met again. Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah. He's one of my best friends. But after that we're like, well just everything will be remote from now on. Also I mean this says a lot about the quality of my scripts. I can type faster than I can think.

Your fingers have no where this is going before your brain does. So you're saying when you read through your, you finish the sitcom episode before you realise how it's going to end? Yeah, yeah, my fingers have done it. So you surprise yourself when you read it. Oh right, nice. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. My fingers are so funny sometimes.

But when they're funny, they're really funny. When they're not funny, oh my god. The thing with writing by hand is my hand can't keep up. So I either end up writing like a GP or I become very frustrated. Yeah. One day, Al, you're going to write something, you're going to type something which is not okay in 2025 and you'll have to say, no, that was my fingers.

That wasn't me. That is not how I think that's not. Those aren't the words of any James. And I've talked to my agent and the head of my management company and they've both said, yeah good excuse, we'll buck you if that's the line, we'll buck you. My fingers are culturally frozen in the 70s, this is what you need to understand. Consider me uncancelled. Out comes a large knife, the gear team as they cut your hands off from the wrist.

Yeah. My fingers are the least woke part of my body, you have to understand. Yeah, I told Sky that and then they cancelled Fancy Football Week. But your hands have got to work on GB News after that, haven't they? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I haven't done a huge amount for Radio Wales for a while. They're terrified of the old 70s fingers. Does it shock you when you're walking past like Dixon's and the TV in the shop window your hands are presenting on GB News? Exactly. What will they sign next? No, I agree with you, Al. I mean, fair play to them. And

they wrote some great stuff as well. I mean, they did it prior to Zoom calls, all that sort of stuff. They pulled it off. Fair play to them. And they wrote some great stuff as well. I mean, they did it prior to Zoom calls, all this sort of stuff. They pulled it off. Fair play. The thing is, you can't lose it if it's on Google Maps. That's the big change, Al. Yeah. Oh my God.

I, the 2009 Edinburgh Festival, I got mugged in the June, or maybe even the July. So a month before the festival and my Edinburgh show existed in a notebook. And I was mugged and they took my bag, they ran off with it. What didn't they take? The notebook, they weren't fans. Not for you. Checked it down in the alleyway and I got it back, thankfully. With some toppers added. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not really in my comedic voice, bit weird, but never mind, I was desperate at that stage. I was willing to do a mugger's joke. Too colloquial,

question mark, written in red. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And nowadays, when I write a show every couple of years in Welsh, a stand-up show, and the way it works is the way it starts is it starts as an iPhone note of ideas, and then I think the iPhone note is big enough to sustain an hour. I go to the Mchynlleth Comedy Festival.

And you read it out. And that iPhone note is, yeah, that iPhone note is enormously important to me, but obviously it's backed up in the cloud. The first year in 2015, it wasn't backed up in the cloud and I lost it at a festival. I think I was doing a gig with you and we ended up staying over.

We stayed in a hotel for some reason, Tom. And I was so, I think because I couldn't face driving back to Cardiff because I was so upset. Because I was like, all of, I'm doing the show in a couple of months time. It feels a bit like you're accusing me, but that's fine. No, no, absolutely not. No, because I just found it in the car. But it wasn't me, my friend Caroline's just, your phone's there. And she was like, yes, sorry, yeah, that's

been a 24 hours, I would care not to repeat. But obviously once I got onto the cloud, then I couldn't lose it. It was always updated. But losing, have you ever lost a notebook? Well, I actually thought, I didn't realize you were referencing diaries and writing something down there when you talked about the great leap of Google Doc. Because for me, I think there's a leap which is even more recent than that,

which is before Google Docs, I would write a Word file. I would then save that Word file to somewhere on my laptop and have no idea where I put it. Basically, what have I called that? What folder is it in? Yes. I will never... I just... it would then just get... every word file will be saved and just go somewhere. Whereas... and now I actually know, okay, I can click here, here's the things I've written. But the amount of things that are just somewhere in my laptop I don't know how to find. And occasionally you would be looking for something else and you'd find it.

And you'd be like, oh, that's draft three of that thing from four years ago. Oh, okay. That's quite good stuff. The BBC got angry about... Yeah, backing things up and being sort of not losing them. That is an absolute game changer for idiots everywhere. Absolutely. Absolutely. Now, I tell you, Al, in terms of files of ideas that we might have on our computers, scripts, stuff like this, nothing compared to the file of flag ideas that Christopher Skull has before any Glastonbury. Now, I'll give you a bit of sort of preamble to this.

Before any Glastonbury, Skull sends the group that we're in for Glastonbury a list of about 15 ideas we had for a Glastonbury flag. I imagine there's a file on his computer with about a thousand. And then do you get them made? Yes, he does. Yes. Where do you get them made up, Kudos? I'm going to watch Wales play the Euros and I would like a flag. I can sort you out with my contact at flagsandflagpoles.co.uk

Is that really a thing? I'm pretty sure. It's pretty specific. They're great. I can't recommend them enough. I mean the amount of PR I've given them down the years. This year especially. Do you want to tell Elle the story of what happened this year at Glastonbury with your

flag? Oh hang on, I can guess. Did it get in the way of people and they couldn't see the headdriners and then they just hated you? Did you trend on Twitter? Because people are like, I hate flags at festivals, look at this guy. Cheers. Is that a history podcast and where's Tom Stadium and I was like, Chris Skull? Yes, that looks like him. A flag at a festival this year, it really jumped home to me. It's a necessity in terms

of finding your friends. Yeah, yeah. So much easier. Either that or a very tall friend. Yes, yeah, absolutely. I use those flares that people shoot up into the air when they're lost to the sea. I carry a pack of ten and every ten minutes I let one off. Even if I'm inside a tent. Even if I'm inside a tent. These last. So, as Tom says, I'll have lots of ideas.

I'd say the top 10% I'll suggest to the rest, like, what do you think of this? The closest to where I came, one of the other ideas I had was a flag that just said, it can't go on like this, can it? It can. The Mick McCarthy quote that is just on a constant rotation around my head at the moment. Which I worried was too niche and I stand by it. Too niche, too niche. Until an Instagram account called Archbishop of Banterbury reposted a flag that said exactly that, got 16,000 likes. But the 10% of people at Glastonbury who get it, they love it. And that really appeals

to my personality. So here's the journey I went on for the flag that was selected. I got into the 1975 because they were headlining Glastonbury. I'd never really listened to them. I listened to them. I loved them. I started researching them and I was like, guys, did we know that Denise Welch is the mother of the lead singer?

And everyone went, yeah, we knew that. Okay, that's pretty mind blowing. That is mind blowing. Yes. I knew it. But it is mind blowing. Tim Healy is. Yes. I knew it. It is. But it is mind blowing. Tim Healy is his dad.

Yes. Tim Healy from Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. I mean that is mind blowing. I didn't know that. Well there you are. That's even new. That's a new fact to me. Okay, wow.

Right, okay. Great. And then Charlie XCX is one of the other big acts that was headlining and she is getting married to, or is married to, the drummer of the 1975 who's the best mate of Matt Healy. So there's a connection between the 1975 and Charlie XCX. And it seemed to me that that connection that sits between them is British cultural icon Denise Welch. In the Venn diagram. Yeah, in the Venn diagram of the 1975 is Denise Welch. So I suggested why not put Denise Welch's

name, simple name, in the style of Charlie XCX's famous Brat album cover. Which is green with black tracks. Nice, nice. So it's green. Fast, so Friday we have the festival, the flags going around, Saturday morning about kind of lunchtime, someone comes up to me and says, you know your flags all over the internet. Oh hello, hello, hello.

I was like, what do you mean? Turns out Charlie XCX has started posting about this flag. And not only that, Denise Welch has started posting about this flag. And there's actually a picture of Denise Welch and Charlie XCX together. And the caption was, we're talking about the brat flag. That's so cool. I was like, wow. And then we were like, well, how can we get in contact with Denise?

Josh Whidde comes with us. He's like, he knows Judy Love a little bit. He texts Judy Love, gets Denise Welch's number. Next thing, I'm having a text conversation with Denise Welch. Oh my god. Denise is like, you've got to send me this flag. I was like, let's get through it. Let's get through the weekend.

I was like, I'll get... You wouldn't have got this with Mick McCarthy. Let me tell you that. There's no way he's got an iPhone for a start. I don't want to brag, but I've got a direct line to Mick McCarthy. Between us, the three of us know some really weird people. I just realised my phone book contains Denise Welsh and Mick McCarthy. Yeah, yeah. Probably the only phone book on earth actually that has both.

When someone says, I've got these are my dream dinner party guests, I could say, we can't arrange that but we can organise a really weird dinner party for you if you want. Of Mick McCarthy to Lise Welsh and Josh Wendickham. So I get out the first, Monday morning, I'm like, Denise, I'm sending you the flag. I pop it in an Uber to her house. She gets the flag. Oh, by the way, there's another, there's an extra bit to this, which is that just before the 1975 came on, a girl, two girls came from the back of Glastonbury to the flag and they

got there and they were out of breath and they were so disappointed. They were like, oh, we saw that flag from the back of the field and convinced each other that only Denise Welch herself could be holding it. And you're not Denise Welch. Which actually, to be fair, would be quite an arrogant choice from Denise Welch. Yeah. We were convinced. Which actually, to be fair, would be quite an arrogant choice from Denise Wells. Yeah. I said, we were convinced. Actually, it would be jaw dropping if it was her flag.

But then they said, well, tell you one thing we were going to do, we were going to try and throw a bra at Matt Healy, but we can't get close enough, so shall we put your bra on the flag? So obviously we went, yeah, that's a great idea. Good idea is a good idea. The bra goes on. People over the weekend are saying, is that Denise Welsh's bra on the flag? Obviously I kept the bra on, the flag. I send it to Denise Welsh. Next thing, Tuesday, Denise Welsh brings the flag into the studio on Loose Women. Oh my God. I didn't know that.

It's on TV, not on air. The flag's out with the bra attached and she tells the whole story. I can't believe you're providing content for Loose Women now. With a final perfect twist. She posts about it doesn't she, Chris Skull thinks. Let's hoover up followers. She's written his name wrong on the Instagram search. Oh no.

All of it is for naught. Well, even more weird, the guy, she spelt my surname with a K instead of a C. And when you go on this... Very goth. The CJ Skull with a K, there's a lot of pictures of Colonel Gaddafi. I said to these, like, I don't mind you getting my name wrong, but just FYI, it looks like a cat. It looks like someone's aping my own account.

How are they doing that? Colonel Gaddafi's number one fan has provided you a Denise Wells flag. There you go. An astonishing yarn. Completely fair play. CharlieXEX, the mainstream media, whatever you want to call it. Anthony's Wells covering your flag. Fair play to you. gripping series. What on earth are you doing? Well, speaking in Tudor English, you know, because we're doing Amberlyn. So I thought it would help people get in the mood and take them

back to the court of King Henry VIII. Now if I know British scandal listeners, and I think I know British scandal listeners, they will be reeled in with talk of treachery, sexual jealousy, backstabbing and treason. There is a lot of that to be fair, but at its heart, isn't it just a traditional girl meets king, girl loses king kind of story? Yeah, with a divorce, a nation altering religious reformation, and the show trial to begin all show trials.

So listen to the story of Amberlyn now. Follow British Scandal wherever you listen to podcasts and binge entire seasons early and ad-free on OneGay Plus. Yeah. But not the first time that one of us has gone viral at Glastonbury. No, it's not, no. Because Tom Crane went viral at Glastonbury probably about 10 years ago now.

The top hit on the fuck my life hashtag, that's what I remember. Is that true? Do you remember? I don't know if we've told this story on the pod. I think we might have. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Do you know what it came up as one of my Facebook memories

about a couple of weeks ago, it must obviously exist around Glastonbury time. Yeah, the number one entry worldwide for hashtag fuck my life was- For idiots. Tell us, tell us story Tom. It made me, nothing has ever made me laugh like that. Well, I laughed hard for about four days.

It was a very simple mistake that any very intelligent person could make. I didn't have a tent. It was my first Glastonbury. I went to buy a tent. Josh helped me. We found a tent. was my first Glastonbury. I went to buy a tent. Josh helped me. We found a tent. I got to Glastonbury.

I went to put out my tent, which was a, what I thought was a pop out tent, but it turned out it was actually a pop out windbreak. So I unfurled my tent in front of all my friends. It emerges into its full shape in a second flat, bang, like a magic trick. And it's not a tent, it's a windbreak. The sort of thing a pensioner gets changed behind on the beach.

So I don't have a tent, it turns out. And what was the headline? Was it the Daily Mirror? It made it into the Daily Mirror under the headline, idiot. That's what it was. That was the one word. And to be fair to them, does a job it does do a job do you know what though for the mirror to say the biggest idiot at Glastonbury there are a quarter

of a million people across the brief that's that's idiocy that's bad that is bad idiot idiot does Idiot. Idiot does idiotic things. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, completely. That is killing me. Hashtag, hashtag, fuck my life. But of course, that's the old me. That's the old me. Because now I go glamping. Okay.

What did you do out of curiosity? What did I do? This gets even more depressing. And this show is the difference between me and Josh Ridicombe, who's unbelievably organised. I slept in Josh's second reserve tent, which he had for his wellies. Oh my God. So he'd bought a secondary tent for his overspill. And it turned out that overspill was me. That's unbelievable.

So I slept in that. Yeah, yeah. That's fantastic. And it was pitched across a sort of like small hedge, I remember, on an angle at one end, and I just couldn't be bothered to repitch it, so I just sort of slept across that hedge, surrounded by wellies. I went to a festival one year,

and I pitched the tent on a slight hill, so I was just, it was like I was sleeping upside down. Surely you put your head at the top, don't you? You let the blood pour to your head. I let all the blood pour to my head and I woke up after an hour with a terrible headache. My head looked twice as big as it usually does. I was like, whoa, what is happening here? Why did you sleep with your head downhill? I think I was just pissed.

Okay, right, okay, fine. I remember thinking it can't be that bad and then after an hour I woke up and felt like I'd been on a choppy crossing. It was just, oh… Keep all the alcohol near your brain, that'll help the hangover. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Remarkable. Oh my God.

Well, there you go. Right, ladies and gentlemen. Oh gosh. Let's talk about what this episode is about. Of course, it's not just about our failures and successes, it's about history. And today's episode is about... This episode is about travel and adventures. And later in the show, I'll tell you about the mission that Thomas Jefferson commissioned

for Americans to travel across North America and chart it all the way to the Pacific. Wow. I'm going to be telling you the story of a much shorter journey, but a journey which kick-started the career of the novelist Robert Louis Stevenson. Oh. And I'll be talking about Eva Dixon, someone I hadn't heard of before, but has got an absolutely extraordinary story to tell and is one of those people in which we feel like I've been wasting my life. But before all that, let's, as always, do a bit of correspondence. You up for that?

Yes, please. Now, a bit different today because today's email has been sent in by the following people. And now these are all the people that have sent this same article into the show literally today. Okay, it goes as follows. Thank you to Jackie Reynolds, Annabel Hicks, Peter Richards, Rob Emma, James Hall, Lisa Roberts, Grace Valliere, Dr Arthur Juester. Also, we continue now, we now go to the DMs, Oli Dillon, Kelly Russell, Laura Rothrell, Lauren, Kerry Gere, and Juliet Weakley. There's many, many poor people who've sent this one article into the show and I'm going to read out this piece that's been sent in. It's a BBC article which says...

Okay. Oh hang on, hang on. Let me guess, let me guess. Is it about... Well apparently Jaden Sancho might be heading to Juventus. Yes, that's exactly it. Completely. Will it be a lone move? Will it be permanent? How will they break down the payments? That's exactly what it is. No, this article is about a World War Two veteran and was in the BBC today. It says, when centenarians celebrate another landmark birthday, it is traditional to ask them what they attribute their long lives to. And it's always stuff that's not healthy.

Yes! It's always, I drink whisky every day. You're quite right. Well, you're in the right ballpark. It's not whisky, but you're in the right ballpark. Let me guess. Can I guess? Is it custard?

Let's find out if it's custard. It says early nights or perhaps a favourite tipple are among the common answers. But 106 year old Leslie Lemons is more unusual. It's custard. Ding, ding, ding. 10 points Chris Skarl. Here's his quote, okay? He's 106 remember. That's my secret to a long life. Custard, custard, custard. Rhubarb from my garden and custard, said Mr Lemon, a great, great grandfather from Aylesbury, Buckinshire. I love this quote. You can't beat it. I have it every day and I want it every day. So Leslie Lemon, which incidentally is the greatest name I've ever heard, served in World War II, has had custard his entire life and he's 106 and still

going now. Doesn't see the doctor, he says. He's not on any medicines, custard his entire life and he's 106 and still going now, doesn't see the doctor he says, he's not on any medicines the article says and he puts it all down to custard. So he was born in what, 1919? Yeah I think that sounds about right. 1919, he doesn't take any medication, he never sees the doctor and he eats custard or drinks? He takes custard. I have it every day and I want it every day. There you are.

Every day. Either he's brick in the rules and is an aberration or Big Pharma is lying to us. This basically means, correct me if I'm wrong, that I'm going to live to 106 minimum. Well it means you're in Montfort. And you guys will be long dead when I'm wrong, that I'm going to live to 106 minimum. Will Barron Well, it means you're immortal. Tom Baird And you guys will be long dead when I've gone. Will Barron Tom, I think you might be a Highlander, you've eaten so much custard. Will Barron I went through a phase of reading a lot of the Yuval

Noah Harari books, and he was talking about, I read his one about the future, you know, and you were talking about the near future, driverless cars, etc. and what we might expect in 50, 100 years hence. And he thinks that eventually medicine will be so good, we'll be a mortal. So what does that mean exactly? Right. So it's not that you would keep going forever unless you have some terrible accident and they come and patch you back up, but they would be able to replace, you know, your organs or bits of you. So there's nothing like, I suppose, a classic car that you tinker with.

You'll always be able to mend and replace, unless, I mean, really horrendous happens. Of course, it is the secret. We just need to stop Tom doing something silly, and then we could be doing a lot of time. Obviously, Chris and I would be long gone, but he could keep the franchise, the brand going for centuries. You're overing up 100% of the ad revenue as well. Completely. What I feel quite sad

about is that this of course means that you guys will be gone before I am. And I had, it's not that I'll miss you, it's the fact that I had hoped in loving tribute to a life as a custard lover, you were going to pour custard over my coffin as I was lowered into the ground in quite a sweet tribute. Well, it was going to be that. I mean, I'm on a WhatsApp, separate WhatsApp group with Skull. He had a big flag plant for Glastonbury. Just a bird's custard with your face just on the tin.

RIP. Britain's biggest custard lover. The other option is filling the coffin with custard, cremating me. Oh, the smell, like a crème brûlée, as I go up in flames, everyone breathing in, going, oh, it is a good food, isn't it, they say, nodding to one another.

It is, yeah. I don't even know what it is. Is it a food? Is it a drink? What is it? Yeah, that's interesting. You just called it a food? I think it's great. The facade is cracking like the top of a creme brulee. Get you a drink that can do it all. It's custard. You make it sound like it's Leslie Lemmon's sort of one of his five a day. All I'm saying is look he's 106. He doesn't see the doctor and he puts it down to custard and I'm living the same life as Leslie Lemmon.

In Australia they didn't have five a day, it was a two and five, so you'd have two pieces of fruit I think and five vegetables. Okay. But it actually should be your two plus five plus one. So it's two pieces of fruit, five vegetables and one big bowl of custard daily. A bowl of custard a day keeps the doctor away. So there you go. Thank you so much to all 55 of you that have emailed in

to point out that I'm living my life correctly. That's quite weird. That never really happens. I remain a custard lover and Leslie Lemmon, you are my new hero. If you want to get in contact with the show with anything, be it custard based, flag based, or if you can even imagine it, history based,

here's how you do it. All right, you horrible lot. Here's how you can stay in touch with the show. You can email us at hello at earlwatertime.com and you can follow us on Instagram and Twitter at owhatatime.com. Now clear off. So this week on the show,

we're talking about travel and adventure. And later in part two, I'll be telling you all about the amazing transatlantic voyage of discovery commissioned by Thomas Jefferson. I can't wait to tell you about Eva Dixon. And to kick things off, I'm going to tell you guys about a vitally important journey in the career of the novelist Robert Louis Stevenson. Now, are you a fan of Robert Louis Stevenson? Have you read any of his work? What did he write? I might have done...

Well, check this out for a couple of novels he wrote. Louis Stevenson, who was born in Edinburgh in 1850, by the end of his career had written classics such as Treasure Island. That's a big one. I have read that. Yeah. If you think that's successful, he also wrote Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Yes, I've read that. That's some real big hitters. I love Treasure Island. I think it's a fantastic book. I think I was too young to read it when I read it. Oh really?

I remember it being quite scary. Yes. Yes, it does have a sinister sort of aspect. I had a similar experience and also it just proved to me, not that it needed proving, that I don't want to live on a treasure island. Unless you can very quickly find the treasure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there's a bridge. And I can just go back to the mainland and spend my booty. That's an interesting question. What thing in your life do you think you experienced too early? For me, it was watching Robocop. Definitely. I stayed at my friend Craig Sergi's house. We watched Robocop. There's a bit where a guy gets melted by acid and it affected my sleep for about two years. Not a lie.

Like two years of just ruined sleep. I can't believe this has never come up in our friendship. I'm exactly the same. The toxic waste, when it crashes into the toxic waste in the car and then he comes out and his skin's all melted and he's whispering like, kill me. It's horrendous. He's awful. The bit I didn't like was when he takes the mask off and you can see his face. Yeah. Oh my gosh.

And I had a very, very similar experience watching The Fly starring Jeff Goldblum. I've never seen that. Yeah, yeah. Because it was shown on ITV, it sort of started at 10 o'clock, alarm bells should have been ringing. How old were you? I was quite young, but I really wanted to see it. I think we had a little telly in our kitchen,

a little black and white telly, and I think I took it upstairs claiming that I was going to watch much of the day in bed. And then I watched the fly and then at midnight I was like, oh good, so that's it. That's it for me and sleep now. the fly and then at midnight I was like, oh good, so that's it. That's it for me and sleep now. And also flies are literally everywhere so that's going to be a shift. I'm never going to be happy again. I'll never feel safe again. So great. Nice one, Jeff Goldblum. He snaps, spoiler alert, he snaps a guy's wrist arm wrestling him in a pub with his superhuman sort of fly strength, and you

see the bones coming out of his arm, and I remember thinking, yep, that's me. Bye! Bye then! It's a bit like when he's squatting and doing his shit on a cupcake. It's a bit like ruining a picnic. So, Louis Stevenson, Robert Louis Stevenson, hell of a writer. There are more novels I could list, but those are his main ones. He's just a fantastically talented guy. So he's born in 1850 but this story begins in 1876. He's sort of just graduated. He comes from a family of engineers, okay, his dad was a lighthouse engineer and he'd studied engineering at Edinburgh University but he dreamed of being a famous writer which was tricky at this point because he was yet to write a book. Okay it's quite hard of being a famous writer, which was tricky at this point because

he was yet to write a book. It's quite hard to be a famous writer when you haven't written anything. So he's thinking, I need to write something. If I'm going to further his career, I really need to start writing something. So he decides, just coming out of university, he's going to go on an adventure with his friend who is called Sir Walter Grindley Simpson, who's a Cambridge educated lawyer. I'm not a bloke by any chance. A Cambridge educated lawyer? No way. No way. Way. Well, if you think his name's Bosch, here's the adventure they went on.

They decided to canoe the rivers of France and Belgium. See, that adventure wouldn't even be on my radar. No, no. Absolutely not. My adventure was Magaluf, but we can't afford that, so we went to Tenerife. A two-week lads holiday to Spain. Do you want to hear, this is how nervous I was when I was 18, I must have been 18. I'd booked a holiday to go to Magaluf with five friends

and I was so nervous about it and so homesick at the idea of being away that they turned up at my house on the first evening, my brother then turned up to drive us to the airport and I was so scared. This is so lame. I didn't go. I stayed at home in tears. Yeah. And my friends all went off to Magaluf. I was so unbelievably sick with nerves. Yeah, it is. I had terrible homesickness as a teenager.

That's what I was. You're left home. Yeah, I hadn't. No. How did you ever experience homesickness? On the two school trips I went on. One to Abagaveni, the other one to Spain, both were horrendous.

Abagaveni is quite culturally different to Bath, though, I'll give you that. The Spain one was near Valencia and every day the kids were going to spend their money on ice creams and sort of fake football shirts they bought from the market. I spent all of my money calling home. I didn't buy anything at all. So here we are, 18, my friends go off to Magaluf and I stay calling home. I didn't buy anything at all. So there you are, 18, my friends go off to Magaluf and I stay at home. God bless my friends for not ridiculing me if you were after that. But anyway, my point is anyone who's young and listening and you're afflicted

by the same thing, it does get better. You get over that sort of stuff. It's just part of you. So he finishes uni, he goes off on this posh trip canoeing the rivers of France and Belgium with Sir Walter Hindley Simpson. Okay. And I'm going to cut to the chase. The guy could write. It's very clear, very quickly. As he starts to write about this adventure, he has a talent. This is how he describes the urge to travel. He said, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move, to feel the needs and hitches of our life more clearly. Not bad. Now this is pathetic, right? But I used to hate the reverence which you were meant to

feel about people who'd gone, in inverted commas, travelling in their early twenties. Right, yeah. Especially if you were someone who went to university. there were usually people who'd taken a year out to go travelling, or they were saving up to go for, to have a year out travelling after graduating, and I never did that. Is that why you like me? Because I'd refused to go travelling.

Yeah, yeah, I was like, this guy, he's completely bath-centric, love it. But when they went, especially if they'd already been, you might have been like, oh my God, you're so wise. Yeah. Oh wow, wow, you were, oh my God, oh god, I can never handle such wisdom. And it never really appealed to me, but I tell you what's given me an appeal for a traveller, Wales away.

Football matches. Now I'm like, I've got to get out of Britain, man. I've got to go to North Macedonia to watch a football match. But how much culture are you soaking up on these three? I do a Briton man. I've got to go to North Macedonia to watch a football match. How much culture are you soaking up on these three? I do a bit of culture. I've seen the Instagram post. There's a bit there. When I was in North Macedonia, my friend Matthew played chess against Macedonia's greatest blind chess player. That's amazing. Okay, I take it back.

So yeah, there's a bit of culture there. It's knocking around. Okay, I take it back. So yeah, there's a bit of culture there. There's a bit of culture. It's knocking around. So he can write and the publishers agree. Within two years, Stephen's first book, An Island Voyage, talking about this journey, is printed, okay? I'll tell you about the journey because it's kind of very important

in his life and his career. It began in the harbour in Antwerp, that's where they take their canoes, Stevenson and his travelling companion Simpson. They set their canoes in the water. Stevenson has called his canoe Arathusa after the water nymph from Greek mythology. What a tit! Okay, Simpson has got a bit more lads on tour. Just call it my canoe for god's sake. Well Simpson has called his cigarette, which does make him sound like more of a lad. And they set off in this journey. They're boats, they're rigged with sails, and with a favorable wind the boats could travel at what is described as a jolly four miles an hour.

Very, very slow. I don't know if you've ever been sailing for it. You've got to walk in pace. But I love that. What's so nice about it is it is that aspect. It's just traveling for the pressure of movement and looking around and taking in the scenery. I've done it on the Norfolk Broads. It's really relaxing.

It does take you out of the pace. No way. I've got a Cannondale road bike. Let me at it. Yeah. The Essex boy in me just wants to get on the Norfolk Broads and tear it away. Speedboat. To the annoyance of the locals.

Yeah. So they're tootling along at four miles an hour. They soon reach the nearby town of Boome, which is near to Antwerp, which Stevenson wasn't a fan of. He writes, Boome is not a nice place. And it's only remarkable for one thing that the majority of the inhabitants have a private opinion they can speak English which is not justified by fact. So he has this idea that people from Belgium think they can speak English but really can't cut the mustard. And he also thought the food was awful. He described the food as non-descript, which

is a proper slammer, a whole country's food. Well, if he's in Belgium, it's chips and mayo, isn't it? Yeah, and waffles as well, I suppose. And really strong lager. And Guilian chocolates. And the next day, they paddle along the Willbrook Canal, which brings them rain soaked into Brussels. And everywhere they went, they were mistaken for beggars and for crooks, okay. I'm going to care to guess why. I thought

this was fascinating. Why do you think people constantly thought these two were up to no good? Had they not shaved because they were, you know, on this sort of lad's adventure slash lad's holiday and they had long, struggling beards? Not a bad guess, Chris, what do you guess? Is this something to do with their dress sense? Were they just dressed differently? So, interestingly, you'd think that. It's not actually the way they looked. It's the fact that back in the 1870s, traveling as a form of leisure just wasn't a thing.

So you traveled to work or to get somewhere. So people assumed they had to be up to something shady, okay? Because just nobody traveled for the pleasure of traveling. It's amazing how leisure changes, doesn't it? It shifts with history and the way that we relax completely shifts with how, you know, cruises and walks and all these sort of things are completely part of the way people relax. But in the 1870s, you just didn't do that. So people were like, what are these guys doing? What are you doing? You're traveling across Belgium. That's not

how humans enjoy this. It's a bit like when I cycled from Swansea to Newport for the British Art Foundation. And we cycled through a tiny little village by the Bolch Mountain. I can't remember the name of it. And a bloke came up his house to tell us that we were lost. And I said, but you, I said, I said, but you don't know where we're going.

And he said, you're definitely lost. If you're not from here, there's no reason for you to be here. That's amazing. If you're here, you're lost. Real Royston Vasey vibes. Yeah, yeah. And he was very nice. Listen, boys, I gotta say, I saw you at the kitchen window.

You're lost, boys. I said, you don't know where we're going. No, you must be. There's no, there's just no reason for you to be cycling around here. I said, we're cycling to Newport. This is where the GPS is taking us. No, well it's wrong.

You lost boys. Love that. Yeah. That's so sweet. They're getting stopped along the way. People think they're up to no good. In fact, on a previous trip, just a couple of years before, Stevenson had been taken to the side by the police, okay, because they'd mistaken him – this is why he'd got in

trouble that time – they'd mistaken him as a German, which was a dangerous thing since sort of memories of the Franco-Prussian War were still raw at that point. And he was thrown in jail for vagrancy. This is what happened if you went travelling around, people just weren't comfortable with it as an idea. This happened to my mate Mark when he did Wales away in Moldova in 1994. He was held at gunpoint. They just couldn't believe that he had gone to Moldova to watch Wales play football.

So this is what, there you are, so going to Moldova with Wales in the early 90s is the same as travelling in the 1870s. This is how he described the interaction with the policeman, which really made me laugh. The policeman said, what's your name? He said, Robert Louis Stevenson. Policeman goes, what? He goes, Robert Louis Stevenson. The policeman goes, right. Okay, we'll have to manage without your name. It's unspellable. It doesn't bother writing it down. That name isn't going to work. We're just not recording you are. Spellable.

I didn't think it was going to be the spelling thing. I thought people might say, you know, it's like giving like a famous name. Okay. Yeah. No one would know who the author is. I thought people might say, you know, it's like giving like a famous name. Okay. Yeah. No one would know who the author is. Oh, you're Robert Lewin Stevenson, are you? Ha ha, very funny. Get in the slammer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, this is a few years before he wrote this first book.

Yeah, of course, of course. But being mistaken for a vagrant wasn't the only problem Stevenson encountered on his journey across Belgium, as the journey from Brussels to Charleroi was kind of the main issue is that they hit no fewer than 55 canal locks along the way. They keep hitting canal locks once again because these canals are for industry that's what they're for they're not for travel. It's what he wrote about it, 55 locks in a day's journey was pretty well tantamount to trudging the whole distance on foot with the canoes upon our shoulders, an object of astonishment to the trees on the canal side and of honest derision to all right thinking children. And so, Stevenson and Simpson, they eventually give up trying to go on their canoes. They continue their journey on from the Belgian capital by train. And along the way, as is often the way for travel writers,

he becomes philosophical. He's still in love with the idea of adventure, but he also has a kind of a new appreciation about the profound experiences that reach us in our own homes. It's quite a sweet thing he writes about being back home. He says, actually, you know, adventures are amazing, but it is when you come back at nightfall and look in the familiar room that you find love or death awaiting you beside the stove, and the most beautiful adventures are not those we go to seek. And at the end of their journey, they travelled some 350 kilometres, which is not a huge journey by any means. I'm sure the ones you'll talk about later in the show will be far longer, but it was one that announced Stevenson as a writer that should be noticed. As one reviewer noted at the time, a livelier little volume or one of more provocative laughter it would be difficult to name and because of his later huge success and

fame as a novelist this little debuted book about this funny little canoe trip continues to this day to provide inspiration for travelers who travel to recreate his journey, travel in the footsteps or in this case I suppose the paddle strokes of the great Robert Louis Stevenson. And so if it wasn't for this little book, if it wasn't for the confidence that it gave him for his writing, there's an argument what came after wouldn't have come. So it's a very important journey in the life of an important man. There you go. Yeah I followed in my friend Mark's footsteps. I went to watch Wales play Moldova in 2017.

Did you get held at gunpoint? No, they were two and a half thousanders. They sort of expected quite a big following by that point. Well, that's the end of part one. Part two tomorrow with interesting topics from both Chris and I. If you'd like them both at the same time, why don't you become an O What A Time full-time? Well then you get the podcast in one big delicious dollop. I was gonna say lump then, but I thought dollop sounded... It sounds like some you might get on Bake Off, is it? It's a lovely dollop of podcast. Anyway, go to owhatatime.com for the details. Bye! Follow Oh What A Time on the Wondry app, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or

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