Episode 1 Holiday of My Lifetime with Len Goodman

Childhood holidays? We all love them, don't we?

Fun in the sun, sandcastles, swimming in the sea...

Can't beat them.

So in this series, I'm going to be reliving those wonderful times

with some much-loved famous faces.

Everyone a winner! Come on! Hook a duck!

And some of the most surprising guests had the most fascinating holidays.

THEY LAUGH

-Hey!

-It's a tug-of-war!

We'll relive the fun... TRAIN WHISTLES

Oh, no, no!

'..the games...'

..and the food of years gone by...

That is a little taste of childhood, right there.

..to find out how those holidays around the UK helped shape

the people we know so well today.

I'm giving you a standing ovation.

So buckle up for Holiday Of My Lifetime.

Can you come on all my holidays?

In today's journey through time, I'm not only driving a classic

piece of British engineering, I'm doing it on an island.

Oh, it's not the Isle of Wight, it's not the Isle of Man

and it's not the Isle of Skye!

But it's an island. And do you know what?

I'm not going to tell you which one.

Although I WILL tell you my the next stop's the airport.

I can't wait to meet my famous friend.

She's been bringing sunshine

and occasional showers into our living rooms for years.

She was born in Morar, Scotland in 1962.

After university, she got a job as a secretary at the Beeb.

But, I tell you what, ha-ha!

The sky was the limit!

She must have been on cloud nine

when she got a job at the weather channel

before moving back to the BBC.

Since then, come rain or shine, she's been telling us

"whether" we should take our brollies or stick on our sunglasses.

She's won the hearts of the nation and she's won awards, too!

And that's your last cabbie clue.

Because she's about to clear customs!

I bet you know exactly who we're meeting.

It's that weather girl we all love to wake up to, Carol Kirkwood.

And I'm waiting to pick her up in a taxi.

Just like the way she would have travelled all those years ago.

Morar, where Carol Kirkwood grew up,

is a small village on the west coast of Scotland.

She lived there with her seven brothers and sisters,

her mum Nancy and her dad Calum, who ran Morar's one and only hotel.

After leaving school, Carol went to Napier University in Edinburgh

and got herself a BA in commerce.

Then she joined the Beeb, working behind the scenes.

But her destiny was to become a television presenter,

something she finally realised in the early '90s.

And after training with the Met Office,

she went on to become Britain's favourite weather girl,

giving us those daily highs and lows on BBC News, World News

and News At Six and of course, Breakfast.

No surprise then,

she's won Best TV Weather Presenter a staggering seven times.

With all those hours she puts in, I bet she's keen on a holiday

and what better island to come to than - drumroll please -

Jersey?

Home of the gorgeous Jersey Royal Potato. I can't wait!

Hooray! Hello!

It's good to see you.

Good to see you.

-You're looking well tanned.

-Look at you though...

-Please give me that.

-Thank you, thank you.

-Welcome to Jersey.

-Oh, it's lovely to be back.

-It's been so long!

-Is it exciting?

It's very exciting, yes, it is.

Now, when you came here on your holidays, who were you with?

I was with my mum and my dad, my little sister and my little brother.

The flight to Jersey was like going abroad, we'd never been abroad.

-Yeah.

-So I remember it so well... We couldn't sleep the night before.

Yeah, I bet it was so exciting.

Now, where exactly are we heading for?

Oh, well, I think St Helier, because that's where I stayed.

-Oh, St Helier!

-Yes.

-Beautiful.

-And what was the year?

-1973.

James Bond, Live And Let Die, 1973.

-You know what the big pop song was?

-No.

Long-Haired Lover From Liverpool.

-Jimmy Osmond!

-Jimmy Osmond... Well, I'm not long-haired and I'm not

much of a lover, but your taxi awaits.

-Thank you, Len.

-Here we go.

Ironically, the weather isn't the best today.

But that's not going to dampen our spirits. Oh, no!

This is your carriage.

Oh, but it's lovely.

Do you know, we used to bagsy seats? So I'm "bagsying" my seat now.

I'm going in the front.

Well, it's normal that you would sit in the back as I drove the taxi,

but on this occasion, special occasion, you're more than welcome.

Let me get rid of this bag and then we'll get you in and off we go.

Brilliant.

With a population shy of 100,000, Jersey isn't a big place.

In fact, the island is only 45 square miles,

just off the coast of Normandy.

But now the meter's running, we're heading for the capital, St Helier,

so Carol can relive her summer of '73 when she was 11 years old.

Every holiday begins with a journey and for Carol, the excitement

levels reached fever pitch before she even left the house.

My brother was coming up for his sixth birthday,

that's what we were celebrating in Jersey.

This was an adventure.

We would leave early in the morning.

Dad would drive, Mum would prepare a picnic.

She would have cooked sausages before, wrapped them in silver foil

cooked eggs before, shelled them, wrapped them in silver foil,

she'd have a flask of tea, we would drive to Loch Laggan and we would stop there.

Oh, but it was brilliant! And that was part of the charm.

Then we carried on to Glasgow, and it's like, "Glasgow?!

-"Goodness me, we're in the city!"

-Yeah, yeah.

You know? It was amazing.

And then going on a plane, we'd never been on a plane!

And coming to Jersey, you know, if I put it into today's terms,

-it was probably like flying to Sydney.

-Yeah.

-It was so exciting.

And while Mum and Dad

and the eight siblings could probably have filled a plane

on their own, this holiday was just for the three youngest children.

But here's what else was going on in the world in 1973.

It was the year we finally joined the EU after being rejected,

thanks to the French president, in both 1963 and '67.

We also saw the debut of not one, but two classic British comedies,

The Last Of The Summer Wine and Some Mothers Do Have 'Em,

with Michael Crawford giving us a bit of "Oooh, Betty!"

And speaking of the telly,

500 million people tuned in to watch Princess Anne tie the knot with

Captain Mark Phillips, which, by the way, was only the second time

in 200 years a British Royal had married a commoner.

And as for music, we were all banging our heads to this one...

# So come on feel the noise... #

LEN SINGS ALONG

# Girls grab the boys

# We get wild, wild, wild... #

Oh, I've got a headache.

# Wild, wild... #

Slade's classic Cum On Feel The Noize

not only entered the UK charts at number one,

but in the first three weeks, it sold half a million copies.

Oh, what a year!

Especially for 11-year-old Carol Kirkwood,

who found everything about Jersey, from its locals

to its beautiful beaches,

nothing short of thrilling.

Well, Carol. Eh?

This is a lovely view.

-Oh! Do you know what, Len? I remember that castle.

-Yeah?

I think, and I could be wrong, it's Elizabeth Castle.

But we went to it and Mum was so concerned

that the tide would come in and we would get stuck,

-but we walked across and we walked right back again as well.

-Yeah?

Which was amazing.

Obviously, that's the same, but has the place changed much since?

Do you remember?

The beach is the same, more scenic than I remember, but still stunning.

As for Carol's holiday in '73, there was one place

her dad practically insisted they visited.

The War Tunnels, a chilling reminder that during World War II,

Jersey endured five long years of German occupation.

Well, do you remember this, the Jersey War Tunnels?

Yes, and do you know what I remember most?

It was chilly inside and I think there was the sound of picks

and it felt... You could smell it, it was quite dank

and there were hospital beds and mannequins...

It was quite scary, actually, when we were kids.

-Scary.

-Yeah.

-I don't do scary. I don't honestly do scary.

But because I'm with you, and I feel protected,

as long as you hold my hand...

-I'll look after you, Len.

-..I'm going to go in.

-Ohhhh!

-Look, it's all dark!

LEN GASPS CAROL LAUGHS

Today, the tunnels form a spooky museum that tells the story

of the prisoners of war who were forced to excavate rock

in order to create a defensive structure

135 feet below the surface.

-This is what I remember.

-Yeah?

-How cold it was and the noises.

-Cold...

-Yeah, and this was the scary bit, Len.

Well, I'm a bit scared, if I'm honest.

Thousands of labourers, many thought to be slaves, were brought over.

Some literally worked to death

and one exhibit attempts to recreate the conditions they endured.

How long would it have taken?

Because you're just chipping into rock, aren't you?

Well, it beggars belief, really, the length of time it must've taken.

GERMAN VOICES PLAY THROUGH SPEAKERS

-Those are German voices?

-Yes.

-I guess shouting the commands to the prisoners of war.

-Yeah.

"Get on with it."

-Well, when we were kids, hearing that, it really would be scary.

-Yeah.

It would have been, and I remember running back to Mum and Dad

trying to find them, because we WERE scared.

It was 40 years since you've been here, or so,

-and it's 50 years since... But I do remember coming here...

-Me too.

-..and this place.

Yeah. Even the smell is familiar.

BOOM

Don't be scared, Carol.

Be a brave little...

INDISTINCT VOICE Stand by?

After taking Normandy,

the Germans decided to bomb Jersey, as they assumed, quite wrongly,

that the island would have a large military presence.

When the planes arrived over Jersey,

they flew low over the harbour and they saw lots of lorries,

which they took to be Army lorries.

In actual fact, they were potato lorries.

Thinking they were military,

they dropped their bombs and they machine gunned the harbour.

Realising Jersey was defenceless,

the first Germans arrived a few days later.

Hitler thought the island was of huge significance during the war.

What Hitler had was called "insel wahn",

which means "island madness".

He was delighted he had them and, my God,

he was going to hang onto them if he could.

The War Tunnels were essential to his plans and were eventually

turned into an emergency hospital for German troops.

Fortunately, the hospital was never finished,

or even used, and today,

its fascinating story attracts visitors from near and wide,

like Carol and her family back in '73,

who despite the odd fright, loved coming here.

When you was a little girl,

did you have ambitions as to what you wanted to be when you grew up?

Yes, I first of all wanted to work for the BBC and secondly,

wanted to be a Blue Peter presenter, so I wrote to the BBC when I was

about 12, saying, "I want to come and work for you, what do I have to do?"

They wrote back, personnel wrote back, saying, "Get a degree."

So I said, "In what?" And they said, "Anything."

So I did that and then I went

and joined what was called the secretarial reserve.

That was very much like having an in house temporary

secretarial agency. I don't think it exists any more.

But I did that and that was great

because I worked in so many different departments,

and programmes like Doctor Who, Beat The Teacher, Newsnight,

-and of course, Breakfast.

-Yeah.

'Even though Carol never did present her favourite childhood show,

'she did end up borrowing their garden on a regular basis.'

I spent years in the Blue Peter garden,

-probably more than the Blue Peter presenters!

-Yeah.

So, there was that little connection with Blue Peter, even though

-you didn't get on the main show.

-Yes.

'For Carol, that was just the beginning, and while I'm

'dying to know what happened next, right now there's much more to see in Jersey.

Like Durrell Wildlife Park, created by author Gerald Durrell in the late '50s,

'so he could help protect some of the planet's rarest species.

'It's also where Carol celebrated

'her little brother's birthday in '73.'

-So, what do you remember of coming here to the zoo?

-Oh, gosh!

I remember the orang-utans, we were fascinated by the orang-utans.

-We'd never seen them. And the monkeys!

-Yeah.

Oh, the monkeys were so naughty and they were running everywhere.

We thought they were hilarious, as well as being uber cute.

Yeah. And wasn't there a bit of an incident with the...?

The orang-utans, yes.

My wee sister, my brother and myself thought this was hilarious.

Mum and Dad didn't find it quite so funny.

We were just walking past

and one of the orang-utans decided to relieve himself. He was dangling...

He was hanging like this and then suddenly,

-everything was just coming out of him.

-Well, you would!

We thought that was so funny!

As I say, Mum and Dad didn't see the funny side of it at all.

'And while that's an experience that's hard to top, I think

'Carol's really going to enjoy my next surprise.'

Carol, this is Chris.

-Oh!

-Not that.

Hiya, Chris. Very nice to meet you.

-And you.

-Chris, good to meet you.

-Hi there.

-Now, Carol remembers vividly the orang-utans and...

-Yes.

Carol, control yourself.

-I think Chris is going to let us feed...

-Oh, my goodness!

-Yes, I am.

-Really?

-Yeah.

We've got a nice mixture of pellet and nuts and raisins for them.

One of their favourites.

So, I'll just grab the bucket and we'll try and get him

to come back outside.

-Wow!

-Wow! Ha-ha!

-Oh, my goodness! That is so cool!

Joy of joys!

'I thought she'd be pleased.

'Let's hope there's not a toilet incident this time!'

How do you feed them then, Chris? What do you do?

Well, this is scatter feed, so what we do is just lots of little

bits, put it in the scoop and just throw it over.

-And you can see he knows exactly what's going on.

-Look at the...

-What's his name?

-His name is Dagu.

-Dagu.

-He's our dominant male.

-He's enormous!

-He is. Have you got more than one orang-utan?

Yep, we've got six in total, so we've got the big daddy,

Dagu, we've got two mums with two babies

and then we've got another juvenile male.

-Look at Dagu's great big sideburns.

-What are those big jollopy things?

-Yeah.

-They are what's known as cheek flaps.

No-one's entirely sure what they're for.

But what we think is it makes him look bigger and also,

-if you want to shout loud, you cup your hands over your mouth...

-True.

..and then it goes further. That's what we think that's for.

# Now, I'm the king of the swingers, oh... #

And right now,

I wouldn't mind betting Dagu's trying to tell us he's Hank Marvin!

Though feeding him is something best done from a safe distance.

-Go on, Carol. Give him a...

-OK. What if I hit him?

-He really doesn't mind.

-OK.

Stand back, everybody.

OK, Dagu, are you ready?

-Oh, I'm so sorry!

-Oh, Dagu.

Oh, no. you deliberately went for him, Carol.

This is how it should be done.

-Oh...

-That wasn't a bad fling cos it had a bit of height to it.

What are you talking about? He's wearing them all now.

OK, wee man. I'll try not to fling this at you.

Look at his face!

-Like, what was this?!

-You've scattered them hither and thither.

He moves a little bit like Anton Du Beke.

LAUGHTER

'I don't know if it's my aim or my one liners,

'but it looks as though old Dagu has had about enough.'

-And he never did his toilet.

-He didn't.

-Oh.

-He's had enough.

He's said - I'm fed up of being pelted by monkey nuts!

'Wouldn't you be?'

Well, do you know what, Chris?

Truly, I could stand here watching them come out and go in and be...

It's fascinating. It really is.

And thank you so much for spending the time with Carol and I.

Hear, hear. Thank you very much, Chris.

-Carol, just see what I've got in store for you up here.

-I can hardly wait.

I do know for a fact that back in '73, Jersey had one

other tourist draw that Carol absolutely adored - go-karting.

Something I'm not too shabby at myself.

I'm going to tell you the honest truth.

Lewis Hamilton, I don't know if you know this,

started out before Formula 1, in go-karting.

-I didn't.

-Oh, yes. 100%. And I was his instructor.

THEY LAUGH

-So I am, you know, pretty red hot on the old go-karting.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

-So, I thought maybe a few laps, a little wager, maybe...

-OK.

-Who pays for the coffee.

-Done.

Done. Come on!

'Now, to succeed in this game, you need to have the right equipment.'

-We're going to look like we're members of the Ferrari team.

-Yes.

'You need stamina.'

Just hold my elbow, George. Help the old people.

'And patience!'

I'll have to take my shoes off. This could take hours.

'But most of all, you need to know how to rattle your opponent.'

Carol, there's a side of me you don't know.

I'm extremely competitive.

-Are you?

-Oh, yes. Most sports I've done and I'm not used to losing.

Oh, gosh!

Well, Len, I'll be driving like Miss Daisy round here.

Well, I'll be driving like Stirling Moss with knobs on.

'And now that Carol's well and truly rattled, it's time,

'as they say, to bring it on!'

-Now, Carol, I'm going to let you go in the front.

-Thanks, Len.

Because obviously, you're only an amateur. I'm semi-pro.

So you jump in that one and I'll get in just behind you.

'All that remains to be said - drivers, start your engines!

'Hang on a minute, no. I'm not ready.'

Now, that's the brake, and that's the goer.

'OK, I'm ready. And we're off!'

CAROL LAUGHS

-This is cool!

-Oi!

Lewis Hamilton will be shaking in his shoes now at this speed.

'Oh, yes! I can already feel the G forces.'

Ha-ha!

'Right then, three laps should separate the men from the boys.'

Go on, Carol!

Go on, girl!

Chop chop!

Wahey!

'Well, I'm not breaking any land speed records,

'but I am in first place.'

Ha-ha!

Come on, Carol!

Come on, girl!

'Going in to the second lap now, and Goodman's firmly in the lead.'

Oh, yes!

Oh, yes!

I was built for speed!

Get out of the way!

'Not on your Nelly!'

Get out of the way!

'Hang on, what's this?

'Carol's a bit sharper behind the wheel than I thought.

'She's only gone and moved into first place.'

Blimmin' Carol crept up on the inside.

It's a liberty! Absolute liberty!

'And just like that, she's snatched victory

'out of me clutches!'

I'm not having this. That was cheating.

'And even though this action replay shows no such thing, I'm going

'to have to say...'

It's a liberty! I want another lap because... No, it's not fair.

'Still, I think Carol enjoyed herself.'

That was brilliant fun! And I overtook Len! Yes!

Carol, I'm not having this. CAROL GIGGLES

I was just enjoying myself, looking at the view,

and I thought, "Oh, look, I've just seen a cuckoo." There was

a small cuckoo there and a chiff-chaff, and while my head

was turned, you sneaked up on the outside, like that.

Very, very upset and disappointed.

'It also means I'll have to go and pay for the teas,

'if I can walk to the cafe!

'Though at least it's a chance to find out how a young Carol

'ended up with a career on screen.'

I used to work at the BBC as a production

assistant behind the scenes

and one of my friends worked for television training

and they phoned me one day and said, "We're looking for presenters, as

stooges, so we can train directors, floor managers, and everybody else."

And then, on the back of that,

I applied for a job with the local cable company and got it.

So I had to do all my own production and research and then presenting.

'Finally, Carol had realised her dream

'and soon even had an agent, though she wasn't properly impressed

'when they suggested auditioning for the Weather Channel.'

I thought, "Oh, I don't want to do the weather."

So I went along anyway because he was basically saying, "Oh, get you!

"What makes you think they're going to give it to you anyway?"

So I went along and it was love at first sight. I just adored it.

Well, I know the Weather Channel from going to America

and it's huge there.

-So, were you based in England?

-Eventually, I was.

-I'd had training in Atlanta...

-Oh, in America?

-In America.

Yes, and then came back to London, which is

where it was based in the UK

and presented from there, and it was a fabulous organisation to work for.

'But then came a slightly more familiar broadcasting

'corporation and once again, Carol got the job.'

-I must say, I love working at the BBC now. It's great.

-Yeah.

You're a real go getter, you know?

-If there's something there that you want, you...

-Go and get it.

Do you know what, Len?

Probably the most common complaint that I get is,

"Why are you so happy in the mornings?"

And the answer to that is very easy.

I love my job with a passion and I work with my friends every day,

-so what's not to be happy about?

-Yeah.

Well, listen, it's lovely to have a cup of tea,

-but I think we'll move on.

-Brilliant.

-Come on.

I'm hoping Carol will give me a bit of career advice.

As you get older, you need a bit of an insurance policy

and I know Strictly's not going to last forever,

so I've always fancied myself as doing a bit of the weather,

so it just so happens that we've got a thing over here...

Perhaps we could go through it and you can see how I do

-and give me a score.

-I'll give you a score.

-Come on then.

'You never know, with a bit of guidance,

'I could be the next Michael Fish!'

Well, do you want to put the weather that we've got in Jersey

-on the map first?

-No!

-OK, then.

-I'm going to start up and work down.

-Got an unruly pupil here!

And of course, we have, as always up in Scotland, we've got

a deep depression, with thunder and lightning.

Very, very frightening, viewers.

And now, of course,

-we come over to the west coast, to where you live, Morar...

-Yes.

And there we are, it's slightly cloudy,

but we have got quite a bit of sunshine.

Yeah, that's what we would call sunny intervals.

-Sunny intervals, it is indeed.

-Beautiful.

You're doing well so far, Len.

Thank you so much.

I'll go down to Newcastle and Sunderland and unfortunately,

they've got a bit of a mixed bag because there is some sunny

intervals, but you have got some damp patches.

THEY LAUGH

So, sunshine and showers.

Yes!

'Oh, yes! I'm a natural!'

And we come now to where I live, Kent, with this.

I think it's an anticyclone. Whatever that is.

I don't know quite what an anticyclone is,

but I would imagine it's something like that.

-That's actually a hurricane!

-THEY LAUGH

OK. And now, here we are...

We're down in Jersey.

-And Len...

-Aw!

..is peeping from a cloud.

That's my favourite, Len. We should have them on all of our maps.

That's brilliant!

I must say, you did really, really well. I give you...a ten.

Ten from Len.

-A ten FOR Len.

-It's a ten for Len. I knew it. I knew it.

I'm a natural at the weather.

'For the time being at least, I'm going to let Carol keep her job.'

Carol, you must know you're everybody's favourite weather

girl and you've presented the weather in so many different places.

What would you say was your favourite place?

Oh, that's really hard, Len, because there's so many.

Recently, Wimbledon,

but to go inside Buckingham Palace as well, that was pretty special.

Yeah. I can well imagine.

You've won Weather Person of the Year.

-How many times have you won that?

-Seven.

Seven! LAUGHTER

Oh, perfect!

-Really?

-Yes.

-Oh, that's incredible.

-That was such an accolade.

I didn't expect it because I always think there's

so many brilliant weather presenters around who are much better than

me, by a country mile, so it was lovely to win it again this year.

Do you know, I think people's childhood reflects on who they are and what they become?

And I must say, you must have had the most happy

and wonderful childhood because you've become such a happy

and wonderful person, you really have.

Thank you.

And to share your little holiday just for a day has been

-absolutely fantastic.

-Len, the pleasure has been mine.

-Give us a cuddle.

-Thank you.

I'm not putting you down now.

THEY LAUGH

'Oh, yes! What a holiday it's been!'

I've got a little thing here.

A little scrapbook of memories of our time here in Jersey.

Thank you so much! That is lovely!

Thank you, Len.

'After all, what's a holiday without a photo?

'Which is why I've made sure our

'special moments have been captured.

'Aw! But I'm not done yet, oh, no.'

I've got one other thing for you. Here's a print from the zoo.

Thank you!

Oh, that is brilliant!

-Oh, that was so kind.

-No.

-Thank you.

-I had such a good time.

-I don't want it to end.

-No. Well... Shall we stay a couple of days?

-Yes.

-No, people will talk!

No, mustn't! THEY LAUGH

'In that case, taxi for Miss Kirkwood.

'We'll be sorry to leave, but it's ta-ta from Jersey.'