Browse content similar to Devon and Cornwall. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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England's stunning South West coast. | 0:00:07 | 0:00:10 | |
-# In Brixham I was born -Bring 'em down! | 0:00:12 | 0:00:14 | |
# But Exmouth is me home from home... # | 0:00:14 | 0:00:17 | |
Boatmen know this shore better than most, and we're here to join them. | 0:00:17 | 0:00:20 | |
# We're never a day behind the tide | 0:00:20 | 0:00:22 | |
# Around Cape Horn we'll go... # | 0:00:22 | 0:00:25 | |
Bring 'em down! | 0:00:25 | 0:00:26 | |
We're embarking on a voyage of discovery in boats - | 0:00:26 | 0:00:30 | |
both big and small! | 0:00:30 | 0:00:32 | |
I'm not the only one of the Coast crew who's taken to the water. | 0:00:32 | 0:00:37 | |
Mark's on a mission to see how the need for speed | 0:00:40 | 0:00:43 | |
created life-saving craft for the Second World War. | 0:00:43 | 0:00:47 | |
Miranda's on the waves... | 0:00:50 | 0:00:52 | |
and under them, searching out seals. | 0:00:52 | 0:00:56 | |
And I hit the high seas - head on! | 0:00:56 | 0:00:59 | |
Bring 'em down! | 0:00:59 | 0:01:00 | |
-# This is now your home, my boy -Bring 'em down! # | 0:01:00 | 0:01:04 | |
This is Coast. | 0:01:04 | 0:01:06 | |
Our journey takes us along Devon's coast and into Cornwall, | 0:01:31 | 0:01:35 | |
out to the Isles of Scilly, | 0:01:35 | 0:01:38 | |
then back to the mainland to drop anchor near Bideford. | 0:01:38 | 0:01:41 | |
But we begin at Brixham. | 0:01:41 | 0:01:44 | |
This small harbour has a big story to tell. | 0:01:47 | 0:01:51 | |
It's the birthplace of this beautiful class of sailing craft, | 0:01:51 | 0:01:56 | |
the famous Brixham Trawler. | 0:01:56 | 0:01:58 | |
I'm on board one of the last that's left afloat. | 0:02:00 | 0:02:03 | |
But this quayside - and many others around Britain - | 0:02:05 | 0:02:07 | |
used to bustle with Brixham Trawlers. | 0:02:07 | 0:02:11 | |
How did this port come to pioneer a trawling revolution that spread around our shores? | 0:02:11 | 0:02:18 | |
The old fish market is quiet today, | 0:02:19 | 0:02:21 | |
but 100 years ago, this place was swimming in fish. | 0:02:21 | 0:02:25 | |
I'm meeting up with veteran Brixham fisherman, Bill Wakeham. | 0:02:26 | 0:02:30 | |
What would the atmosphere have been like where we're standing? | 0:02:30 | 0:02:33 | |
It would be like a main street of London, | 0:02:33 | 0:02:35 | |
people would be going back and forth all day, | 0:02:35 | 0:02:37 | |
coming down picking up fish, there'd be boats taking stores on board to go away, | 0:02:37 | 0:02:42 | |
there'd be filleters, packers, people with horse and carts, | 0:02:42 | 0:02:45 | |
small lorries coming in and out all the time. | 0:02:45 | 0:02:49 | |
-What are these fish on the ground? -That'd be skate. | 0:02:49 | 0:02:51 | |
So these were trawled and brought into the market to be sold? | 0:02:51 | 0:02:54 | |
Yeah. But then in the 1860s, | 0:02:54 | 0:02:57 | |
they brought the railway into Brixham, and all of a sudden... | 0:02:57 | 0:03:00 | |
Manchester, Birmingham, London was open then overnight. | 0:03:00 | 0:03:03 | |
-The railway changed everything? -Everything. | 0:03:03 | 0:03:06 | |
The boats doubled in number in a matter of ten years. | 0:03:06 | 0:03:11 | |
Harbour towns like Brixham began to boom when the railways arrived. | 0:03:11 | 0:03:16 | |
Before then, there was little point catching more fish than the locals could eat. | 0:03:16 | 0:03:20 | |
But rapid transport by train meant fish could now be sold fresh in the big cities. | 0:03:20 | 0:03:26 | |
Brixham seized the initiative, taking the ancient art of trawling to a new level. | 0:03:28 | 0:03:34 | |
Large, fast sailing craft capable of dragging big, heavy nets were commissioned. | 0:03:35 | 0:03:41 | |
Their purpose? | 0:03:41 | 0:03:42 | |
To catch more fish than ever before. | 0:03:42 | 0:03:46 | |
Only when you get close you realise how big these sailing trawlers are. | 0:03:49 | 0:03:53 | |
Yeah, some size, aren't they? Everything's solidly built with it. | 0:03:53 | 0:03:56 | |
The Keewaydin is one of the few Brixham Trawlers still sailing. | 0:03:56 | 0:04:01 | |
100 years ago, they went out in waters teeming with fish. | 0:04:03 | 0:04:07 | |
Trawlers like this one landing up to a ton a day. | 0:04:07 | 0:04:11 | |
But could they manage that now? | 0:04:11 | 0:04:13 | |
We're on a mission to see what impact these boats have had on the seas they once sailed. | 0:04:13 | 0:04:19 | |
Ruth Thurstan, from the University of York, | 0:04:21 | 0:04:23 | |
has analysed records of UK catches going back to 1889. | 0:04:23 | 0:04:28 | |
So we can see the effect of the trawling revolution started by these boats. | 0:04:29 | 0:04:35 | |
Throughout the late 19th century, fish landings were increasing - | 0:04:35 | 0:04:40 | |
this was because vessels were getting bigger and more seaworthy | 0:04:40 | 0:04:43 | |
and could go further out to sea to fish. | 0:04:43 | 0:04:46 | |
And then, once you get to really the 1970s, you get this big drop. | 0:04:46 | 0:04:51 | |
It just goes over the edge of a cliff, doesn't it? | 0:04:51 | 0:04:54 | |
Yes. You can see from that point, it keeps dropping. | 0:04:54 | 0:04:56 | |
However, fishing vessels have been getting more sophisticated, | 0:04:56 | 0:05:00 | |
and their ability to catch fish has been increasing and increasing over this entire period of time. | 0:05:00 | 0:05:05 | |
-So you'd think landings would continue to go up and up. -Yeah, exactly. Yeah. | 0:05:05 | 0:05:09 | |
And of course, they haven't, because the stocks couldn't take that pressure. | 0:05:09 | 0:05:13 | |
The impact of beam trawling on fish like cod and plaice has been immense. | 0:05:14 | 0:05:19 | |
The research indicates that nine out of ten | 0:05:19 | 0:05:23 | |
of these bottom-feeding fish have been scooped from our seas. | 0:05:23 | 0:05:27 | |
Fishing has always been tough, | 0:05:27 | 0:05:31 | |
but with dwindling fish stocks, today's fishermen have to work even harder. | 0:05:31 | 0:05:36 | |
Research into the history of catches reached a staggering conclusion. | 0:05:37 | 0:05:42 | |
Fishing vessels today are having to work 17 times as hard | 0:05:42 | 0:05:46 | |
in order to catch the same amount of fish that they were catching in 1889. | 0:05:46 | 0:05:49 | |
-17 times harder to get the same number of fish? -Yes. | 0:05:49 | 0:05:54 | |
We're chasing some of the last fish in the sea. | 0:05:56 | 0:05:59 | |
Decent catches are only possible because of the technology in today's trawlers. | 0:05:59 | 0:06:04 | |
Fishermen work more effectively than their grandfathers, | 0:06:06 | 0:06:09 | |
but some fish stocks are much lower. | 0:06:09 | 0:06:12 | |
Nine out of ten cod, plaice and haddock have been taken in just over a century. | 0:06:12 | 0:06:17 | |
The Brixham Trawlers began a boom that fed the appetite of Britain. | 0:06:17 | 0:06:23 | |
Now these boats have gone... | 0:06:23 | 0:06:24 | |
and so has their catch. | 0:06:24 | 0:06:26 | |
The south coast of Devon. | 0:06:40 | 0:06:42 | |
It's not all golden sands and cream teas. | 0:06:47 | 0:06:52 | |
The locals originally earned their living from the sea, | 0:06:52 | 0:06:55 | |
with fishing, boat-building and the occasional bit of smuggling. | 0:06:55 | 0:06:59 | |
There are plenty of pleasure craft on this coast, | 0:07:00 | 0:07:04 | |
but others take to sea in deadly earnest. | 0:07:04 | 0:07:07 | |
Like here, at Plymouth. | 0:07:08 | 0:07:10 | |
The port is home to the largest naval base in western Europe. | 0:07:10 | 0:07:14 | |
The Royal Navy may boast the biggest ships here, | 0:07:16 | 0:07:19 | |
but for years, this was home to small, life-saving boats of the Royal Air Force. | 0:07:19 | 0:07:25 | |
During the Second World War, | 0:07:27 | 0:07:29 | |
the vessels of the Air/Sea Rescue Service | 0:07:29 | 0:07:31 | |
were the saviour of RAF crew who'd ditched in the sea. | 0:07:31 | 0:07:37 | |
To discover how these speedboats were born, | 0:07:37 | 0:07:40 | |
Mark Horton's meeting an Air/Sea Rescue veteran. | 0:07:40 | 0:07:43 | |
70 years ago, Alf Emmerson was one of the fastest men on the water. | 0:07:46 | 0:07:51 | |
He's 94 now, but his passion for fast boats is still strong. | 0:07:51 | 0:07:57 | |
In a quiet corner of the marina, an old Air/Sea Rescue boat, | 0:07:57 | 0:08:02 | |
like Alf used to pilot, is being brought back to life. | 0:08:02 | 0:08:06 | |
Is this similar to the ones that you worked on? | 0:08:06 | 0:08:08 | |
Yes, by Jove, it is. | 0:08:08 | 0:08:11 | |
-When where you last on board one of these things? -60 years ago! | 0:08:11 | 0:08:14 | |
Right. | 0:08:16 | 0:08:18 | |
There's no stopping him, is there?! | 0:08:18 | 0:08:20 | |
No, no, he's away. | 0:08:20 | 0:08:22 | |
Oh, yes! | 0:08:23 | 0:08:26 | |
Look! | 0:08:26 | 0:08:28 | |
Slow... | 0:08:28 | 0:08:30 | |
Half... Ahead. | 0:08:30 | 0:08:33 | |
Oh, blimey! | 0:08:33 | 0:08:36 | |
Back when Alf was a captain, opening a throttle would power his boat over the water at up to 35 knots. | 0:08:37 | 0:08:45 | |
A quick response was crucial in saving ditched pilots from the freezing sea. | 0:08:45 | 0:08:50 | |
The rescue boats were the unsung heroes of the Second World War, | 0:08:54 | 0:08:59 | |
but their greatest champion was a hero of the First World War. | 0:08:59 | 0:09:04 | |
None other than Lawrence of Arabia! | 0:09:04 | 0:09:07 | |
Lawrence's adventure in the desert campaigns made him a national celebrity. | 0:09:09 | 0:09:15 | |
But by 1929, to escape the limelight, | 0:09:18 | 0:09:21 | |
he came to Plymouth on a very different mission. | 0:09:21 | 0:09:25 | |
When he arrived here, Lawrence of Arabia wasn't Lawrence any more - | 0:09:26 | 0:09:31 | |
he'd changed his name to Shaw. | 0:09:31 | 0:09:34 | |
Aircraftman Shaw had entered the Royal Air Force with a quiet posting to Plymouth away from publicity. | 0:09:34 | 0:09:41 | |
But the work that Lawrence did on this coast | 0:09:41 | 0:09:45 | |
would thrust him back into the limelight | 0:09:45 | 0:09:48 | |
and help bring to British military a new type of vessel - | 0:09:48 | 0:09:53 | |
speedboats like this. | 0:09:53 | 0:09:56 | |
Famed for living dangerously, | 0:10:05 | 0:10:06 | |
when Lawrence wasn't buzzing around Plymouth on his motorcycle, | 0:10:06 | 0:10:10 | |
he took to the sea in his new speedboat. | 0:10:10 | 0:10:13 | |
Lawrence's biographer is Jeremy Wilson. | 0:10:17 | 0:10:19 | |
So it was a boat very much like this? | 0:10:21 | 0:10:23 | |
-Yep, yes. -There she is. | 0:10:23 | 0:10:25 | |
Did actually Lawrence enjoy boating? | 0:10:25 | 0:10:27 | |
No, he loved boating, he loved anything that went fast, | 0:10:27 | 0:10:30 | |
and the sensation of speed, driving around in this thing, | 0:10:30 | 0:10:33 | |
must have been absolutely wonderful for him. | 0:10:33 | 0:10:35 | |
Lawrence used his speedboat to escape the frustrations of his duties | 0:10:37 | 0:10:42 | |
whilst stationed at the RAF seaplane base in Plymouth. | 0:10:42 | 0:10:45 | |
Lawrence's fast craft was in stark contrast | 0:10:49 | 0:10:52 | |
to the ponderous, old-fashioned vessels used to reach the seaplanes. | 0:10:52 | 0:10:58 | |
In 1931, Lawrence's frustration with these slow vessels would reach breaking point | 0:10:58 | 0:11:04 | |
when he witnessed a terrible flying boat crash. | 0:11:04 | 0:11:07 | |
The seaplane was being piloted by an inexperienced pilot | 0:11:07 | 0:11:10 | |
who wasn't fully trained, and he crashed it | 0:11:10 | 0:11:13 | |
and killed himself and a fair number of the people on board. | 0:11:13 | 0:11:17 | |
Lawrence rushed down to the duty boat, and they came out to the site, | 0:11:17 | 0:11:21 | |
they chugged out to the site in this old-fashioned boat, | 0:11:21 | 0:11:24 | |
and it was obvious that if they'd used a fast motorboat, | 0:11:24 | 0:11:28 | |
they would have got there far faster, they would have saved more lives. | 0:11:28 | 0:11:32 | |
Lawrence knew lives depended on faster rescue craft. | 0:11:32 | 0:11:37 | |
It became his mission to persuade the RAF to adopt new designs, | 0:11:37 | 0:11:42 | |
more like his own speedboat. | 0:11:42 | 0:11:45 | |
Fortunately, a far-sighted British designer, Hubert Scott-Paine, | 0:11:46 | 0:11:51 | |
was already developing revolutionary fast boats. | 0:11:51 | 0:11:55 | |
In 1931, Lawrence was assigned to trial the new craft for the RAF. | 0:11:55 | 0:12:01 | |
To understand the novel design of the boats Lawrence was testing, | 0:12:01 | 0:12:05 | |
you need to look below their waterline. | 0:12:05 | 0:12:08 | |
The crucial thing was the shape of their hull. | 0:12:08 | 0:12:11 | |
That is the new type of boat. This is the old type. | 0:12:12 | 0:12:15 | |
-Exactly, yes. -What's the difference? | 0:12:15 | 0:12:17 | |
Well, the old boats - like your ship here - | 0:12:17 | 0:12:20 | |
are called displacement hulls. | 0:12:20 | 0:12:22 | |
They're round-bilged and very heavily built, | 0:12:22 | 0:12:25 | |
so they operate at what is called displacement speed. | 0:12:25 | 0:12:29 | |
So as the hull goes through the water, | 0:12:29 | 0:12:31 | |
it has to... move all the water underneath it? | 0:12:31 | 0:12:35 | |
It literally pushes the water aside as it goes along. | 0:12:35 | 0:12:38 | |
Now, if you look at a modern hull like this one, | 0:12:38 | 0:12:42 | |
you'll see it's very sharp entry, | 0:12:42 | 0:12:44 | |
a flat bottom, and designed to travel over the water and not through it. | 0:12:44 | 0:12:49 | |
So the boat, as you increase the power, will lift itself | 0:12:49 | 0:12:52 | |
up onto what's called the plane | 0:12:52 | 0:12:54 | |
and then proceed a lot faster than its displacement speed. | 0:12:54 | 0:12:58 | |
Let's have a go. | 0:12:58 | 0:12:59 | |
So if we set it moving, it starts off at displacement speed. | 0:13:00 | 0:13:04 | |
Then if we open the throttle, it'll start to plane, | 0:13:04 | 0:13:08 | |
and the shape of the bow lifts the forward part of the boat out of the water. | 0:13:08 | 0:13:12 | |
So the boat literally rides up over the wave... | 0:13:12 | 0:13:16 | |
Over the waves and can go a lot quicker. | 0:13:16 | 0:13:19 | |
'This novel hull design was adopted by the RAF | 0:13:19 | 0:13:23 | |
'for a new fleet of fast, life-saving craft.' | 0:13:23 | 0:13:26 | |
These boats that Lawrence of Arabia had helped to develop | 0:13:28 | 0:13:33 | |
were ready for the Second World War. | 0:13:33 | 0:13:37 | |
The RAF's Air/Sea Rescue service now had the tools to do their job more effectively. | 0:13:37 | 0:13:43 | |
During the War, the Rescue Service saved some 13,000 lives, | 0:13:45 | 0:13:51 | |
but sadly, Lawrence never saw his beloved boats in action. | 0:13:51 | 0:13:56 | |
He died after a motorcycle crash in 1935. | 0:13:56 | 0:14:02 | |
Lawrence's love of speed, that would save so many lives, | 0:14:02 | 0:14:06 | |
took his own. | 0:14:06 | 0:14:07 | |
On our journey around the South West, | 0:14:20 | 0:14:23 | |
I'm heading out to the edge of the Atlantic - | 0:14:23 | 0:14:26 | |
the Isles of Scilly. | 0:14:26 | 0:14:28 | |
It takes around two and a half hours to reach the islands aboard the Scillonian ferry. | 0:14:32 | 0:14:38 | |
The Atlantic swell and rolling waves make this one of Britain's great voyages. | 0:14:38 | 0:14:43 | |
Believe it or not... | 0:14:52 | 0:14:54 | |
this is a fairly mild day! | 0:14:54 | 0:14:56 | |
This passage of water is notorious for its heaving seas, | 0:14:56 | 0:15:03 | |
a reputation which has given this little ship the nickname... | 0:15:03 | 0:15:10 | |
The Great White Stomach Pump. | 0:15:10 | 0:15:12 | |
And I'm beginning to know why. | 0:15:14 | 0:15:16 | |
This vital link between the Isles of Scilly | 0:15:19 | 0:15:21 | |
keeps going through all weather and it's an unforgettable journey. | 0:15:21 | 0:15:26 | |
The Scillies are an archipelago with over 100 islands of all shapes and sizes. | 0:15:30 | 0:15:36 | |
Getting around means hopping off one boat and straight onto another. | 0:15:39 | 0:15:43 | |
'Only five of the isles in the Scillies are inhabited.' | 0:15:46 | 0:15:50 | |
The most northerly is St Martin's. | 0:15:51 | 0:15:54 | |
It may be a small community with a slow pace of life, | 0:15:58 | 0:16:02 | |
but you can still get fast food. | 0:16:02 | 0:16:04 | |
Here on St Martin's is one of the most remote fish and chip shops in the UK, | 0:16:04 | 0:16:11 | |
but that's not the only reason it's unusual. | 0:16:11 | 0:16:16 | |
Unlike other chippies, this one doesn't rely on a delivery van for its ingredients. | 0:16:16 | 0:16:21 | |
Islanders have to be resourceful. | 0:16:21 | 0:16:24 | |
To get the catch of the day, | 0:16:26 | 0:16:27 | |
I'm meeting up with the restaurant's fisherman, cook and owner, Adam Morton. | 0:16:27 | 0:16:32 | |
What made you open a fish and chip shop on a tiny island in the Atlantic? | 0:16:32 | 0:16:38 | |
I needed an outlet to sell my fish. | 0:16:38 | 0:16:40 | |
There was nothing of that nature on the island, | 0:16:40 | 0:16:43 | |
so I gave it a try and haven't looked back since. | 0:16:43 | 0:16:46 | |
When Adam goes out, he only takes enough fish for a night's serving. | 0:16:47 | 0:16:52 | |
He uses a line to catch pollock. | 0:16:52 | 0:16:55 | |
-There's definitely one on there. -You got one? -Yeah. -Got a fish! | 0:16:55 | 0:16:59 | |
-These... -That's a good-size fish. | 0:16:59 | 0:17:01 | |
-..will go in the restaurant. -That is beautiful. | 0:17:01 | 0:17:03 | |
I think we might just have another one - can you feel that? | 0:17:03 | 0:17:07 | |
Yeah. | 0:17:07 | 0:17:09 | |
OK, that will do us for today. That's all I need for tonight in the restaurant. | 0:17:11 | 0:17:15 | |
'A fish supper wouldn't be complete without chips. | 0:17:16 | 0:17:19 | |
'Adam's brother James looks after the spuds.' | 0:17:19 | 0:17:23 | |
Quite a family team - one brother catching the fresh fish and the other one... | 0:17:24 | 0:17:28 | |
growing the organic potatoes. | 0:17:28 | 0:17:31 | |
Yeah, well, over here, you know, | 0:17:31 | 0:17:33 | |
there's only a 100 people on the island in total, | 0:17:33 | 0:17:36 | |
so you do tend to end up working with family most of the time. | 0:17:36 | 0:17:41 | |
Within half an hour, the spuds are sizzling, | 0:17:42 | 0:17:46 | |
along with the pollock plucked this afternoon from the sea. | 0:17:46 | 0:17:50 | |
A small-scale, sustainable operation. | 0:17:50 | 0:17:54 | |
Fiona, thank you very much indeed. That looks fantastic, thank you. | 0:17:54 | 0:17:58 | |
This is the freshest plate of fish and chips I've ever been served - it's barely two hours old. | 0:17:58 | 0:18:04 | |
The pollock... | 0:18:06 | 0:18:07 | |
A bit sad, given it was such a beautiful fish, but look at that. | 0:18:07 | 0:18:11 | |
Mmm! | 0:18:14 | 0:18:15 | |
I'm not the only mouth around here that needs feeding. | 0:18:15 | 0:18:21 | |
Miranda's in search of another mammal with a healthy appetite for fish. | 0:18:21 | 0:18:26 | |
'The Isles of Scilly are a great place to see grey seals. | 0:18:28 | 0:18:32 | |
'Around 250 have colonised the rocky outcrops around the eastern islands.' | 0:18:32 | 0:18:38 | |
One of the unusual things that brings the seals here | 0:18:38 | 0:18:41 | |
is actually the grass, | 0:18:41 | 0:18:42 | |
and it's rather special grass that grows underwater. | 0:18:42 | 0:18:46 | |
'This wonderful underwater garden is a perfect breeding ground for fish. | 0:18:48 | 0:18:54 | |
'I'm hitching a ride with a team of marine biologists heading out to survey the sea grass. | 0:18:54 | 0:18:59 | |
'Hopefully, the seals won't be too far away.' | 0:18:59 | 0:19:03 | |
So why is sea grass so important? What is it about the habitat | 0:19:06 | 0:19:09 | |
that makes it so important and worth protecting? | 0:19:09 | 0:19:12 | |
It's vital for fish like cod, pollock, bass. | 0:19:12 | 0:19:17 | |
The juvenile animals live in the sea grass | 0:19:17 | 0:19:19 | |
and they grow up to a bigger size. | 0:19:19 | 0:19:21 | |
-It's a great place to hide. -Exactly. It provides shelter from predators | 0:19:21 | 0:19:25 | |
that might come in, trying to eat them. | 0:19:25 | 0:19:28 | |
'Time for me to get a seal's-eye view of the long grass where tasty treats might be hiding, | 0:19:29 | 0:19:35 | |
'and you don't have to go too far down to see it. | 0:19:35 | 0:19:38 | |
'Sea grass thrives in shallow waters, | 0:19:41 | 0:19:45 | |
'because, like any other green plant, it needs sunlight to grow.' | 0:19:45 | 0:19:50 | |
It's beautiful down there, the water is crystal clear - | 0:19:51 | 0:19:54 | |
it's like diving in the Bahamas! | 0:19:54 | 0:19:55 | |
This is one of a few flowering plants that grows in the sea, | 0:19:55 | 0:20:01 | |
relying on water-borne pollen to reproduce. | 0:20:01 | 0:20:05 | |
The sea grass flourishes in the warm tidal streams around the Isles of Scilly. | 0:20:05 | 0:20:10 | |
The shelter of the lush underwater meadow generates rich pickings for hungry seals who hunt nearby. | 0:20:10 | 0:20:16 | |
They haul themselves onto rocks to digest their food. | 0:20:20 | 0:20:24 | |
Seals eat a tenth of their body weight a day and they're not fussy. | 0:20:24 | 0:20:29 | |
Sand-eels, cod and pollock are all fair game. | 0:20:29 | 0:20:33 | |
High tide's the best time to see them hunting. | 0:20:33 | 0:20:36 | |
I'm hoping for a close encounter. | 0:20:36 | 0:20:38 | |
The best way to get their attention is to be really still, | 0:20:40 | 0:20:43 | |
relaxed, unthreatening and let them come to you. | 0:20:43 | 0:20:47 | |
Wow! Just had one of the adults swim right underneath me, | 0:20:50 | 0:20:54 | |
playing with my fins, swimming around, | 0:20:54 | 0:20:57 | |
just checking me out, and then just swam straight off. | 0:20:57 | 0:21:00 | |
Absolutely beautiful. | 0:21:00 | 0:21:02 | |
Seals spend four days at sea for every one on land, | 0:21:07 | 0:21:11 | |
and this one seems quite happy to hang out with me. | 0:21:11 | 0:21:15 | |
It's a real privilege. | 0:21:15 | 0:21:17 | |
They're really beautifully designed for the water, | 0:21:24 | 0:21:28 | |
the torpedo-shaped body, completely streamlined. | 0:21:28 | 0:21:31 | |
And these amazing whiskers on their face. | 0:21:31 | 0:21:34 | |
Those whiskers are super sensitive. | 0:21:36 | 0:21:39 | |
They can detect the trail of disturbed water left by a fish up to half a minute after it's passed. | 0:21:39 | 0:21:45 | |
Oh! | 0:21:56 | 0:21:57 | |
That was truly amazing. | 0:21:57 | 0:21:59 | |
We just had such great fun, there are loads of seals out there, | 0:21:59 | 0:22:03 | |
wanted to be really playful. Oh, just really beautiful. | 0:22:03 | 0:22:07 | |
The seals are part of a magical world, | 0:22:09 | 0:22:12 | |
one where grass grows under the sea, and sharing it with them was an experience I'll never forget. | 0:22:12 | 0:22:17 | |
'Leaving the Isles of Scilly, I'm heading back to the mainland, | 0:22:32 | 0:22:38 | |
'taking the direct route over to the Cornish coast.' | 0:22:38 | 0:22:42 | |
This jagged shore has always inspired mixed feelings. | 0:22:59 | 0:23:04 | |
Many ships have been wrecked here and many lives lost. | 0:23:04 | 0:23:08 | |
But the raging sea also brings some to contemplate its power. | 0:23:08 | 0:23:14 | |
What better place to linger than here? | 0:23:14 | 0:23:16 | |
A tiny refuge with a remarkable sea view, | 0:23:16 | 0:23:20 | |
built by a rather eccentric clergyman. | 0:23:20 | 0:23:23 | |
This is known as Hawker's Hut. | 0:23:23 | 0:23:26 | |
It was built in the 19th century by the local vicar. | 0:23:26 | 0:23:30 | |
Robert Stephen Hawker was no ordinary cleric. | 0:23:34 | 0:23:39 | |
He once posed as a mermaid and used to take his pet pig on parish visits. | 0:23:39 | 0:23:44 | |
He constructed this hut using timbers salvaged from shipwrecks. | 0:23:44 | 0:23:48 | |
And there was never any shortage of wrecks around these craggy cliffs. | 0:23:50 | 0:23:55 | |
Being a man of the cloth, | 0:23:57 | 0:23:59 | |
Hawker couldn't turn a blind eye to the fate of those who perished. | 0:23:59 | 0:24:03 | |
Hawker took it on himself to carry the bodies of drowned sailors from that beach | 0:24:05 | 0:24:10 | |
all of the way up the cliffs and then half a mile inland to the church, | 0:24:10 | 0:24:14 | |
where he could give them a Christian burial. | 0:24:14 | 0:24:18 | |
The Reverend Hawker brought the bodies of around 40 sailors to his parish church at Morwenstow. | 0:24:22 | 0:24:28 | |
The men were buried in a plot marked by the salvaged figurehead | 0:24:30 | 0:24:34 | |
from The Caledonian, which sank in 1843, drowning many of her crew not far from this churchyard. | 0:24:34 | 0:24:41 | |
Most sailors whose lives end in tragedy at sea have no known grave, | 0:24:45 | 0:24:50 | |
but Hawker - a man of wonderful eccentricity and great compassion - | 0:24:50 | 0:24:55 | |
made those that those who were cast onto the shores of his own parish were not forgotten. | 0:24:55 | 0:25:00 | |
He turned this into a kind of shrine, | 0:25:00 | 0:25:02 | |
somewhere to contemplate the price seafarers have paid | 0:25:02 | 0:25:06 | |
for sailing this rugged coast. | 0:25:06 | 0:25:09 | |
Bideford's link to the sea is the River Torridge, | 0:25:12 | 0:25:16 | |
which opens into a peaceful estuary... | 0:25:16 | 0:25:20 | |
..with skeletal remains concealed in the mud. | 0:25:22 | 0:25:25 | |
This is like an elephant's graveyard for ships. | 0:25:25 | 0:25:29 | |
It's where old boats come to die. | 0:25:29 | 0:25:32 | |
It might look like the maritime heritage here is dying, | 0:25:32 | 0:25:36 | |
but these wrecks litter the lair of a much bigger beast. | 0:25:36 | 0:25:41 | |
That'll be the shipyard, then. | 0:25:41 | 0:25:43 | |
This sleepy corner of Devon | 0:25:46 | 0:25:49 | |
is the unlikely home of a ship-building industry dating back over 500 years. | 0:25:49 | 0:25:56 | |
The Appledore Shipyard has built more than 350 vessels - | 0:25:56 | 0:26:01 | |
among them, the Scillonian ferry | 0:26:01 | 0:26:03 | |
that took me to the Isles of Scilly earlier. | 0:26:03 | 0:26:06 | |
They've also worked on some of the Navy's biggest ships. | 0:26:09 | 0:26:13 | |
Gerald Lee was here when this building was opened 40 years ago. | 0:26:13 | 0:26:19 | |
We've built tankers, gas carriers, platform support vessels, | 0:26:19 | 0:26:23 | |
ferries, tugs. You name it, we've had a go at it. | 0:26:23 | 0:26:27 | |
What are you particularly proud of? | 0:26:27 | 0:26:29 | |
HMS Scott has got to be up amongst it, for the Royal Navy. | 0:26:29 | 0:26:35 | |
When you think that she was 128 metres long, and the dock is only... | 0:26:35 | 0:26:39 | |
124, it takes some working out. | 0:26:39 | 0:26:43 | |
Did you build her without a front? How did she fit? | 0:26:43 | 0:26:45 | |
We fitted her in diagonally, and the bowsprit came right out over the dock head, | 0:26:45 | 0:26:49 | |
so it was an achievement, yes. | 0:26:49 | 0:26:51 | |
My journey around the south west coast has taken me onto the water in boats of all shapes and sizes. | 0:27:16 | 0:27:23 | |
Oh, my goodness, look at that! | 0:27:26 | 0:27:27 | |
Here, the call of the open sea is very much alive. | 0:27:30 | 0:27:35 | |
In the ebb and flow of history, industries come and go, | 0:27:43 | 0:27:47 | |
empires come and go. | 0:27:47 | 0:27:49 | |
But there are some traditions, some ways of life - | 0:27:49 | 0:27:52 | |
boat-building, fishing, sailing - | 0:27:52 | 0:27:54 | |
that are so much a part of what it means to be an islander that they'll never disappear. | 0:27:54 | 0:28:00 | |
And here in the West Country, they seem to be thriving. | 0:28:00 | 0:28:03 | |
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd | 0:28:16 | 0:28:21 |