Tales from the Departure Lounge

#8 Jeff Wilson (To The Ends Of The Earth)

• Andy Plant & Nick Cuthbert • Season 1 • Episode 8

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Jeff is an award-winning wildlife film producer who has worked on titles such as the BBC's Planet Earth and Frozen Planet, Disney's Penguin and Netflix's Our Planet - and unbelievably he agreed to take on his wildest adventure yet, the TFTDL podcast! 

He's a natural adventurer, often happier in his own company, in remote locations than anywhere else. Working for the BBC Natural History Unit as a biologist and researcher he is privileged to call  Sir David Attenborough a close friend, along with an entire penguin colony who call him by his name. 

This is a unique view on humanity and why we are addicted to travel. We hope it will make you stop, think and laugh. We loved it. Enjoy some Tales from the Departure Lounge from Jeff Wilson. 

Final boarding call: Antarctica 

This is episode is sponsored by The PIE Live - interactive, two day events that build knowledge and networks in international education - check out dates and venues at www.thepielive.com

Tales from the Departure Lounge is a Type Nine production for The PIE www.thepienews.com

Andy:

you have to tell us what is under N D A

Nick:

The, the voice of God.

Andy:

And it turns out penguins are nasty pieces of work.

Nick:

Welcome to Tales from the Departure Lounge. This is a podcast about travel for business, for pleasure, or for study. My name's Nick and I'm joined by my co-pilot, Andy. And together we're gonna be talking to some amazing guests about how travel has transformed their. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the journey. Welcome to the podcast.

Andy:

So today we chat with Jeff Wilson, a wildlife producer and director who's worked on Global b BBC and Disney projects that you've probably watched. Calling David Attenborough a good friend. He's a, a natural adventurer, often happier in his own company, in remote locations than anywhere else. And because of this, he's seen some of the world's most interesting natural pH.

Nick:

Yeah, this is next level travel. I would equate it to the experience of an astronaut. Being shipwrecked, it's being away from humanity and then having this unique perspective back on the world that very few of us will get.

Andy:

He's seen things that others will never see, and most people who travel will spend a lot of time in airports, hotels, exhibition halls, but he spent time on icebreakers, in biplanes, in jungles, and living with indigenous tribes. He's a modern day Indiana Jones with a camera instead of a whip. Let's get some tails from the departure lounge with Jeff Wilson.

Jeff:

If you're there for months and, we were there for four. You start hearing the penguins call your name. Then, 10 seconds later there. Stream of Hot, sticky, fig infused urine that just started pouring down on my head. that's why people get addicted to travel is that you just put yourself in situations that you need to think He stopped the whole viewing and he said, who the. Has chosen the music on this.

Nick:

so before we get into the episode, I wanna quickly tell you about the pie live events that are happening around the world after a sold out European conference in London. The next dates will be the 24th and the 25th of July on the Gold Coast Australia, followed by the 13th to the 14th of November in Boston in the United States. These are short, sharp, two-day in-person events where we bring together the best of the sector to discuss global trends in international education, but crucially through a regional. The feedback we always get is about the value in networking and public private connections that are made. So if you are an aspiring leader looking for professional development, or a CEO or director looking to expand your network, check out the pi live.com. Come with us, come and meet us. We're so excited to be taking these events on tour, and I look forward to meeting you all soon. We've also left some links in the episode notes, so let's get on with the podcast.

Andy:

Jeff, welcome to Tales from the Departure Lounge.

Jeff:

Hey Andy. Hey Nick. Nice to see you And nice to hear you, and thanks for having me.

Andy:

So you are one of the most well traveled people. I know you've been to some pretty out there places. Where would you take our listeners today and why?

Jeff:

everything that I do is about trying to get away from other people. I'm not, not trying to be rude to anybody, but it, it's in my nature to Try and spend some time away from humanity. And so for me, the greatest place to do that is often the toughest places to get to. And, I'd like to take you to Antarctica. And then maybe if you fancy it, we could, take a trip to Schnabel

Andy:

Sounds amazing.

Jeff:

I've been very, very fortunate, in all of the work that I've done to go to Antarctica, I think seven times now. across, The, projects that I've worked on. Frozen Planet for the B bbc and, I made a, a Disney Nature feature film there, called Penguin. Antarctica, as you know, is a big, Huge round continent, and the geography of it, is enormous. but there are certain places that you can target for, really good wildlife, and it has such rich seas that all of The, wildlife, hangs out around the coastline. It's carved up in a kind of pie, and you have to go in with logistics based on which part of the pie that you are going to. So either you go to the American part of the pie or you go to the British part or the Chilean, or the Argentinian, or The, Indian or the Russian, depending on what you wanna. Pick up. but, the great joy about Antarctica is it takes an enormous amount of planning and logistics to get there. And then somebody drops you off in a helicopter and leaves you on your own, and then there's no one else around for, you know, 800 miles. And to me, that's The pinnacle of what I do because it just means that you're on your own and, no one's bothering you and you can do what you want and you can take your time and, you have to be self-sufficient. So, yeah, that Antarctica is special.

Nick:

I'm assuming that landscape is like being on the moon, isn't it?

Jeff:

Antarctica is an extraordinary place because it's one of the few places on the world that, you can travel to that hasn't changed. in thousands of years. I was, a voracious reader of, the Scott Expedition manuals. And there. was even a scientist called Wilson who went to the place that I was working called Kate Crozier. And it's the place where, Scott's Expedition traveled to in the famous story of the worst journey in the world. And you are sitting there in Antarctica, and it is probably exactly the same as what Scott experienced when he was there. It hadn't changed at all. And it's particularly good with the soundscape because everywhere that you go in the world, you can see and you can hear the influence of man. And even if it's just a, a, an overflight of a 7 47, you know, going between two places, you can be in the middle of nowhere in Papua New Guinean, you'll probably hear a plane or you'll hear a chainsaw or somebody kind of shouting. In Antarctica, you don't get any of that. You just hear geology And nature, inaction around you. I suspect that's what the moon's like, you can set foot in a place that no other human has set foot on. And, long may that last because, as our planet warms and as our planet becomes more resource hungry, Antarctica's gonna be at the sharp end of where humanity's gonna test itself on its morals.

Nick:

How many people would be on a shoot like.

Jeff:

Depending on the type of cinematography that we're doing, we try and keep it to two or three people. unless you know, someone like Sir David is there, there's no need for a sound operator., and there's no need for, you know, loads of kind of support. Everyone who works in my industry is a jack of all trades, you need to be. At the same time, a camera operator, the same time a director, the same time a, a sound recordist, because to be multi-skilled like that means that you are spending the money Observing wildlife rather than, buying great kit or, having lots of people there and having to feed a team and Antarctica is an interesting one because, often it's down to how many people can you squeeze into an emergency shelter when things go south, as it were, when things get really nasty. And it does there. And um, and a number of places I've worked there is, there are four bunks or five bunks in an emergency shelter. and, if a big storm comes in, which they do frequently, you don't want to be, 10 of you on location because you could be in that hut for a week. It's be better to only have two of you and then you have to choose the person you're with very carefully if it's only two of you What I feel about it is I love the fact that that doesn't matter how much we do, mother nature is still in control. And You have to be really zen with that. You know? I like the idea that there we're being constantly as humans kind of being put, back in our place and being told, you are not in control. It's not on your time scale., mother Nature's gonna do things her way and you've gotta adjust to that. So yeah, generally I spend my time teaching people, to be a little bit more relaxed about the things that You can control and the things that you can't.

Andy:

But Netflix says dance polar bears dance like ice

Jeff:

Yeah. yes. actually. They're, they're really, they're they're, we've been working with'em for a while now, and they do understand that that time equals quality equals unique behavior, and there's no way of breaking that, that model,

Andy:

I started watching a film the other day called Proxima and it was about people going to Mars. Uh, and I guess it's the same for you. You have to be pretty certain and trusting of the people that you go on these missions with these adventures with.

Jeff:

The nature of the industry weeds out people who have, kind of demons, because if you're spending a lot of time on your own, you need to be accepting of other people's points of view you can't go into these things being an alpha character, you have to be relaxed in other people's presence. Then the, it's a whole different level when you're with the wildlife, cuz you then gotta kind of understand what the wildlife's thinking as well. So I have some very, very, very close friends that I like working with, for instance, I'm speaking to Mark, on the phone. My wife will say to me, well, you talk to Mark more than you talk to me. and you guys have got some sort of strange language that, you complete each other's sentences and, that that inevitably happens. And um, and I think you have to break outta that when you come back pretty quickly. Otherwise it, it looks a bit weird. It looks a bit sort of, um, what's that cowboy film where they end up in a tent together? Broke back mountain.

Andy:

And uh, they say you should never work with children or animals. You are working with animals at scale. What, uh, what are. penguins like to work with?

Jeff:

Most people love penguins and they think they're funny and they think they're cute. To work in a penguin colony is to, what I imagine it's like to work in a war zone and it's a god awful. awful place. It's a highly competitive, highly noisy, highly smelly, you never see it on screen. And I've been trying for decades to inform the public as best I can. But whenever it comes to the stories the commissioners wanna see funny, cute, and adorable. But actually what's going on is things are killing each other left, right, and center. There's unspeakable, incestuous acts of sex going on left, right, and center. there are you know, there are bodies everywhere decaying. You know, I think the interesting thing about most penguin colonies, if you? every species apart from an emperor penguin, which nest or ice, um, they, they're built up over thousands and thousands of years. And there's no soil as such in Antarctica. So the bedrock or the sort of substrate is all dead penguins, decaying penguins. So they're nesting on top of their ancestors that are decaying over thousands of years. and so it's, it is, it's horrible. And then, once you get past 20,000 and, some of the colonies I've worked in are are 500,000 strong. You can barely hear yourself. Think, and if you're there for months and, we were there for four. alone for the frozen planet project, you start hearing the penguins call your name. You know, you haven't heard any humans say anything. And so, their noises start Becoming like voices in your head. And so it's, it's an awful thing.

Nick:

I want to know what the penguins are saying to you.

Jeff:

Yeah,.Well, they do, you know what you do, you do start to lose your mind You're not having a conversation with anybody but your other, work colleague. And now I think everybody would start talking to themselves, but the penguins just start filling in the blanks, you know, that you can just hear someone say Jeff, Jeff, and then, and then you turn around and, you know, or they start swearing at you, those kind of things. I once did a project in Papua New Guinea where we were 16 weeks alone in a hide, you have no one to speak to. and um, and again, the, the mental kind of, trials and tribulations that you go through, in having to kind of train your mind and your body to be still, and to not kind of collapse, under the weight of your thoughts is quite an extraordinary thing to go through.

Nick:

I think prison would be a breeze for you, Jeff. Yeah.

Jeff:

o other than there other people there, you enter into a state, of, zen meditation in those circumstances that where you can switch off and kind of go to sleep. But all of your senses are highly attuned to the things that are going around you. You've trained your mind to trigger can wake you up and you can be turning a camera on in seconds but the flip side, when you're traveling and You do that, Is that if you have attuned your brain, so specifically to noises and silence is my wife Erica, Would always throw a party like Jess's returning from so somewhere, and he's been away for a lot. And then she'd get a load of people in a pub and I'd walk into this pub and I wouldn't be able to hear a single person speak because the noise was so overwhelming. And it was really stressful for me. And, um, it took me about five years of our early marriage to just get up the strength to say to Erica, I, I really don't like those parties. It's great. All my friends wanna come, but it's really hard for me to cope with.

Nick:

It's like PTs D isn't it? It's like Penguin PTs D.

Jeff:

P T S D, except I went back three or four times, which is weird. I mean, I, maybe that's just me.

Andy:

You go away for an awful long time, come back. Does it make you feel different about humanity? Are you sort of a more offended by humanity when you come back from living in the.

Jeff:

It's a good question. People who do business trips, for three or four days at a time. I, I, think that's far more stressful because, your life never enters a pattern, you never be able to sort of work out where who you are meant to be or where you are meant to be, or how your life is meant to run. I think for my wife and I, it's always been a lot easier. The longer the trip, then both of you get into a pattern of what your responsibilities are, but to do that every, three or four days, I think must be much, much harder. In answer to your question more directly, I've always found it very hard to, to accept the way that Western culture, and the way that we as the uk and it's amplified in the US I think just the way that we. operate in The, sort of rampant consumerism that goes on. And if you step out of our world and And you, are not buying things every day or, You are not being sold stuff or being told stuff by people, news, or whatever, then, you realize just how, uh, how manipulated we all are. And I think I struggle with that. I struggle with that. and, and especially when I'm back, I, and I'm guilty about it as, as anybody else. I'm not gonna be a saint. I go off and buy things and listen to things and watch the news as much as anybody else. But if you've stepped out of that world, then you realize that, we Are in the. western world, at least not under our own agenda, much as we like to think we are. and that's difficult to stomach.

Nick:

You must have seen the film into the Wild, a Sean Penn film. Where he rejects the rat race and walks into Alaska and it's idyllic until nature catches up with him.

Jeff:

I always found that film strange, that the moral is that nature will catch up with you when actually the you know, I interact with. Thousands of people across the world who have rejected that way of life and who are doing very noble and, passionate things about wildlife and living in extraordinary places and, use the world for their own agenda when they need to, but actually do live in the wild and have these amazing, in my view, romantic Fantastic and, uh, exciting lives. I think if you spend time in the natural world, you realize that the moral of what into the wild was, is that. Humans and the wild are never compatible. But actually, I, I, think completely the opposite is that we've just lost the ability to be compatible with, the natural world. And I think most people have it within them to understand what an animal's thinking, how to survive in a certain location or a certain place. I think it's more ingrained in us than people realize and that they just need to swallow the fear that they have of the natural world.

Nick:

Seeing somewhere new. I get this real sense of fulfillment. I feel like it's a life's purpose to explore the world. And when you see somewhere new, it really stirs my soul, It, it does something to me, but also I get the same sensation when nature reveals itself do you feel the same?

Jeff:

I do. I absolutely do. And I, I attribute it to the fact that I think that we underestimate how much our brain wants variety, when we talk about how it, fulfills our soul, maybe it is the biologist in me, but I, I sort of see it as getting that endorphin rush that your brain gives you when you learn something new. and that can be as easy as staring out a train window, In a place that you've never been before. You, everybody gets that feeling when they're seeing, new parts of the world. Most wildlife is so complex and in many ways unpredictable that to witness something that you weren't expecting is again, just laying down like a neural pathway that just gives you an endorphin that you store so I, I agree with you. that's why people get addicted to travel is that you just put yourself in situations that you need to think and you need to be aware and you need to keep your eyes open and keep, keep your mouth shut. Not talking and just listening

Andy:

Have you ever had moments where you are in the natural world, that, feeling of connection

Jeff:

One of my all time favorite experiences was working for the Planet Earth Series for the bbc, And, at the time my job was to put up tree platforms in the top of trees and we were filming chimpanzees in Uganda. And, um, these particular chimpanzees had never. Really seen a human in a tree before, and we wanted to see how that worked out. So the plan was, is that we were gonna put up a big tree platform in the top of a big fers, a big fig tree, leave it there for a week or two weeks, let the chimpanzees habituate to it, and then come back and start filming from it. And when I say a tree platform, it's like a, a a three foot by three foot square bit of metal, right? It's nothing fancy. So my job was to put these things up and so I climbed up the top of this tree, hauled up the platform, rigged it, and as I was rigging it, the chimpanzees, which were meant to be in a different part of the forest returned, and these are very well known hunting troops. You know, they kill and eat monkeys regularly. and so, This quite un hairy white, easy to kill monkey at the top of a big, uh, big tree standing on a platform. And there's no way I could have got away from these chimpanzees. And it was really dicey. I was really frightened. Um, and I radioed down to the people on the ground, said, say, what do you think I should do? And we walked through the options like we could throw yourself on your ropes, but you know, being on your ropes while something attacks you is probably worse than being, attached to a tree. So I sat still and the the chimps all came up and there was about, I think 30 of them. And I was about 80, 90 foot up in the air and they came up and, sat all around me in a big ring. and um, sat down and just started eating figs and completely ignored me. and One. It was an amazing experience because I didn't have a camera. It was just me. I sat at the top of this canopy with wild chimpanzees, but the the biggest life lesson is that it didn't give a damn. I had assumed that I was going to be the center of their world, and humans are really good at putting ourselves as sort. Egocentric at the, at the center of the, world, and they didn't give a damn. And then, so I sat there and, they ignored me for hours and hours and hours and I, you know, my job was simply to habituate. Chimpanzees, you know, we, they are, they are our closest relatives. You can see intelligence happening when you are, when you are watching them, you can see thought process. And then I was brought back down to earth at the end of this thing because there was this baby chimpanzee that decided it wanted my attention and it would throw things at me and was trying to hit me with sticks. And then that wasn't working. So it was throwing figs at me and it was getting really angry and screaming at the top of its head. And, um, and then it went really quiet and I thought, oh God fi finally he's gone away cuz I was trying to avoid eye contact with him. And, uh, and then, 10 seconds later there. Stream of like hot, sticky, fig infused urine that just started pouring down on my head. And he was like up on the, he was two, two feet above me just just emptying his bladder on my head because he knew he could. And um, and I had to sit there and take it. Um, Again, you know, mother Nature has this amazing ability of just anchoring you in your position in the world. And to be pissed on by a baby chimpanzee shows me where I stand. Really?

Andy:

the next section of the podcast is called any laptops, liquids, or sharp objects. Essentially, what do you need to take with you whenever you go overseas?

Jeff:

It's pretty simple for me. It's. Anything with chili in it, You gotta have a really good chili sauce., mainly because you never know, what's gonna be put in front of you if you ever travel in Ukraine or, or any of the Russian states, not to denigrate Slavic food, but it's pretty bland for the most part. And, you definitely need a bottle of something to go with you and the higher the concentration of chili, the longer it's gonna last. So that's really important for me. Um, I think it, this is probably a bit controversial and probably from the times, my youth, but. I always wanted to have, a pack of cigarettes with me, and it's not because I was really addicted to smoking, it's because there's nothing better than just taking a time out with whoever you are with. And, especially if you've had something traumatic happen. You know, if you are, you're in a car crash or you're getting bothered from some, group of people who don't want you to be there, or you need to sit down And work something out with somebody. And there's nothing better than just pulling a pack of cigarettes out often and just kind of sharing that with somebody There's something. I dunno, sharing a fag that, is quite bonding, in many, many places in the world. And then, you know, I think you've probably heard this a lot with your podcast, But music is just so important. Sometimes if you've been in a penguin colony for the last 96 hours and you are bored of penguins, you wanna come back and stick on some thrash metal and just break things you know?

Andy:

I saw a video the other day and it was the iconic scene from Dirty Dancing, but they'd replaced the music with the Muppet Show theme, uh, and it was amazing. So I, I imagine when you're staring out at these Landscapes or penguin colony, putting on some. Ironic music could be quite funny.

Jeff:

It is funny you say that because when I went back to make this Disney film, which is targeted at a very different audience to a David Asper film, it's a family, audience North American, um, we cut the whole film to eighties music. And people thought I was joking, but when I was there it was kind of like, no, like the, the lead character is this penguin who's, a new dad He's a doofus and, he would definitely listen to Whitesnake. so let's get Whitesnake in there., and Patty LaBelle and, all of these quite really kind of every man radio heavy songs that you hear if you'd switch on a radio in the States and I had this moment with the head of Disney and, it was really intimidating where we had the screening with him. And, you know, the first thing that comes on is this eighties track that,, I I purloin from, um, Beverly Hills cop. And, he stopped the whole viewing and he said, who the. Has chosen the music on this. And I had to stand up and just say, yeah, that was me And um, and he, he basically took me apart for five minutes. And then luckily I explained myself, and everybody else in the theater then went to him afterwards and said, Hey, you, know what, that really works. Because you buy into what the lead character is because he's the every man new dad that would listen to that, and that came from the idea of listening to stuff. when you're in the PE penguin calling you occasionally you need to escape.

Nick:

Jeff, how much does that happen where you get all the way to the end of a project and then some suit, some producer says, yeah, can you just change that?

Jeff:

It happens a lot, but that it's not specific to what I do I think the positive way to look at it is that any creative enterprise, the more voices there are in the room, typically the better the product. My privilege and my job is to kind of. The natural world in front of as many people as possible. And people aren't out there waiting for the next Jeff Wilson film. It typically happens at the 11th hour, some suit has made you change it the last minute and it's just stressful. But, maybe I'm just. Naive, but I think they're doing it to make the film better.

Andy:

The next section of the podcast is called What's the purpose of your Visit? Why do you Do what you do, Jeff?

Jeff:

Clearly what I do is adventurous. And when you're in your twenties, I mean, I see it with people joining our company now, is the adventure and the excitement and the, romance of what we do is inevitable, and I won't deny that, but then I guess once you get older and wiser and you start questioning what your purpose is in the world, then you, you anchor in on the things that are important. And, I I, I think for me, I realize that through what my parents gave me and my upbringing, I, do understand the natural world more than other people., and I'm happy to be arrogant about that, and by understanding it, I do have this special. Insight and skill that I'm able to capture it and predict it and be able to be that person who puts it in front of other people. And so when you realize that you realize that there is a soft power that you have in bringing people along on the journey with you to love the natural world, and it gives me enormous pleasure that I go to places now and there are scientists who are working in remote field stations who say, I do my job because I saw Planet Earth and that's all I ever wanted to do is go out and see wildlife. And you realize that you've created in some way, inspiration for people to go out and do that. And I did. I was the same. As a child watched David Attenborough's life on Earth and For some of us it clicked,it makes me enormously proud to understand that, half a billion people have seen, planet Earth, that our planet on Netflix, is the most watched documentary on Netflix. I was on there last night and it's still, trending and it's been, up there for three or four years now. So to know that you've gone out and sweated blood and tears I do believe converts to people to the cause and, and that's why I do it

Nick:

The, university that I worked for had a pair of nesting peregrine falcons, and what I loved about it is that whatever marketing we did, the nest cam, the webcam got more views than any other page on the website. I always thought that was A real indicator of how much people love the natural. The same university also had an adult webcam, which people don't know about,which also attracted a lot of hits as well.

Jeff:

Nice. Maybe if you combine the two, you could get some sort of like David Attenborough after dark kind of

Nick:

I also want to hear about G Noble. I, I, I've been excited, so I don't want to forget.

Jeff:

I went to Schnabel, for the, our Planet Series. I was making the forests film, for that. And, there was quite a lot of interesting work and studies going on Incher Noble about the recovery, and, resilience and rewilding of that area. And there was some really interesting camera trap footage, of the animals that were coming back into parts of Cherno. I mean, it's one of the most photographically beautiful places I've ever been, but it's also couched in, a disaster that was avoidable and had huge implications with the people who live there. The story around Chino is less about the radiation than it is about the absence of humans. I think, and that's the one I was trying to tell, is that by removing humans from the environment in 30 years, the environment was very quick to repopulate itself regardless of the radiation risk. I mean obviously it's difficult to go there now, but at the time I was there, you could go into parts of Cher Nobel and see it for yourself. there were sort of weird, Cher Nobel tours that you could do. and,, I think it's quite healthy for people to see what the end of the world looks like. One of the things for me that was really striking is that people were given 24 hours notice to leave. and they left everything behind and took the things that were important to them. And if you go into an environment like that, and you see what people leave behind when they have to take the essentials, it makes you come back and look at your own household and think how much of the non-essentials you have in your house. You know, if you were made to leave in 48 hours, there's, we are all kind of out there buying stuff that we don't need. And, you know, there is so many non-essentials in all of our lives that, it does make you think about that quite heavily.

Andy:

Can I just say, Jeff, you are positively glowing today.

Jeff:

yes, It's the, uh, it's the halo effect. I, everywhere I go, there's this light that sits above my head. I don't, I can't get rid of it.

Nick:

On a serious note, did you have to take extra precautions, I'm assuming you did, to protect against radiation?

Jeff:

With the type of radiation that is prevalent in BLE because of the, leakage from the reactor. it's about the amount of exposure you get over what period of time. And so there are very strict, rules as to how long you can spend there and in what areas you can work in. Um, and we had, uh, do dusts that we carried with us that sort of measured our exposure. And actually having, we worked there for on And off for four weeks. And in truth, the amount of radiation exposure that we got was less than most people get from flying in a international flight. Cause I don't know, most people know, but you do get radiation exposure when you're, in the atmosphere in a, in a in a 7, 4, 7 going on your holiday. Um, and uh, we, we got less incher noble than, than most people get in a flight. So it was relatively safe.

Nick:

I'm not gonna be able to cope. I mean, I'm worried about D V T now. I'm worried about radiation.

Jeff:

Yeah, I mean there are many people who would argue, and I think there's a biological truth to it, that a certain amount of radiation. is not a bad thing.

Nick:

good for the digestion,

Jeff:

Yeah, good, for the, good, for the the rogue cells.

Andy:

Have you always had three years, Jeff?

Jeff:

Luckily I'd done all my breeding by the time I'd went there, so I wasn't really worried about, um, you know, dangly bits getting infected.

Andy:

The final section of the podcast is called Anything to Declare, and it's really a free space for you to talk about anything you want to, you can either, leave some information about a project you're working on or you could, leave a Traveler's wisdom or both.

Jeff:

I've said it a few times I think in this conversation For me as a traveler,, if there's one thing that I would pass on, it is about being open to experience and aware and perhaps recognize that the timeframe that we as individuals work on, particularly in the West, and the, objectives that we have on a daily basis are not the same in other places in the world and not same in the natural world. And so to be able to morph and change timeframe and to listen and to observe is perhaps the greatest. Gift that we have as humans, To sit quietly and watch and listen is something that I'm surprised that there isn't a whole movement of, wellbeing experts who are taking people and making them sit quietly and watch things. because it's, it is an amazing thing. And it will transform, your experience of the world.

Andy:

Shut the fuck up movement. I like.

Jeff:

Yes, exactly.

Nick:

You've mentioned to David Attenborough Times. I just wondered if you could just pay tribute to him. I saw him give a graduation talk, and he talked to the graduates about their single goal in life was to go out and find the truth. As someone who spent So much time with him and knows him well, could you just tell us a bit about.

Jeff:

I have beyond my wildest dreams has been incredibly privileged to spend the time that I have with David and, um, right from the word go from when I did my first job. So, and it's been going on for 20 years, so I am very lucky in that way., what David is remarkable for is being an unbelievable communicator. Whoever he comes across. So whether you are six years old or 96, whether you are, Working on a farm, or whether you are a Cambridge graduate, uh, Uber brain, David has the ability to communicate at the level of the people who are in front of him and I that I've never met that in any other person. and that's, except. I think the other thing that is really remarkable, and it's it's becoming more and more evident, the holder that he gets, is just how hard David works. when I've been with him numerous times on location where we've done nine or 10 hours out in the field working and the rest of us would collapse into our beds at the end of the day and David would go and write a chapter of a book, or, amend a script or something like that. And, many people don't realize that we, for most people, they, we, we know and love David for everything that he did from 55 onwards, that's when he started really coming onto our screens as a wildlife TV presenter. and as somebody who's still 10 years away from 55. But it gives me a lot of inspiration to know that, Between the ages of 55 and 96. There's an awful lot one can do, and an awful lot of good, and an awful lot of adventure that can go on in your life. Icon status requires graft, that's what makes him special.

Nick:

I think that's the perfect way to finish His, to life's great adventure.

Jeff:

Exactly. Yeah. And long may it last long, may people go out and explore.

Andy:

Thanks for coming on, Jeff. It's been awesome having you.

Jeff:

Thank you for having me.

Nick:

Hello everyone. Thank you so much for listening. If you wanna listen to more episodes, you can find them at Tales from the departure lounge.com.

If you want to sponsor an episode, that's now possible as well. We're also having lots of fun with the frequent flyers club. Where we hear your stories, that you can send into sick bag@talesfromthedeparturelounge.com.

Nick:

Tales from the Departure Lounge is a type nine production for the pie.

People on this episode

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Andy Plant

Host
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Nick Cuthbert

Host