Kent The Travel Show

I'm going to try to go to sleep now and try and forget that I'm entirely

Wrestling a guy in front of 2,000 people is a bit further

This week, I'm in Kent, in England's south-east corner.

This is the city of Canterbury, a place of pilgrimage ever

Apparently, if you look up at the stained glass windows -

ah, here we go - one of the panels depicts a fairly

Really, the thing that put Canterbury Cathedral on the map.

It's got Thomas Beckett, who, at the time, was the Archbishop

of Canterbury, being killed by two knights with swords

and it was his murder and martyrdom that made

this a place for pilgrims to come from across the world.

Britain's ancient places of worship have always attracted visitors.

Canterbury's competition comes from sites like York Minster,

Westminster Abbey and even the Holy Island of Lindisfarne,

but around the country there are religious treasures to be

This is Fordwich, about two miles down river from Canterbury.

With 370 local inhabitants, they reckon this is

You wouldn't know it now, but tiny Fordwich used

It was here they unloaded the French stone that was used

Here, in this barely used Norman church, is my bed for the night.

So it's very reassuring walking through a graveyard to get

I'm here for a spot of champing, church camping.

It's available at 12 historic venues around the country.

Beautiful ancient sites that are rarely, if ever,

used as places of mass worship any more.

Money raised from letting champers like me stay means the crumbling

buildings are spared a slow, inevitable decline.

You can see from the architecture, that there would be little bits

from every generation because we all make our mark on it,

often trying to modernise it, whether for the good or the bad

So I'm keen to give this champing a go, so where will I be sleeping?

You'll be sleeping possibly in the executive pews because it's

meant to be the warmest part of the church.

It's good that it's a box pew because it stops the drafts.

There are a few nice touches here - that good old stable,

the tea tray and a basket of goodies with biscuits and wine.

So I guess there's a risk, what if people are here

There is an agreement that you have to agree to in terms of how

you behave in the building as you hire it, as it were.

Particularly here, it speaks silence and good behaviour and one hopes

that people would enjoy that and appreciate that.

I mean, it's only 6:00pm and it's already cold.

Safe to say, champing is usually more of a summer activity,

at least the pub next door looks like it's going to be warm.

People have said, you know, waking up in this amazing

place in the summer, with the bird's singing and the sun

pouring through the windows, is just something very special.

We are given historic churches by the Church of England

where there's no longer a worshipping congregation,

but the church is of such significant historic and cultural

value that it needs protecting and preserving for the future.

Why would anyone want to go champing?

Because you get to spend such a lot of time in truly

The way people usually visit historic churches,

and I've seen it, is that they go to the door,

they pop their head round and they go -

oh, there's a font, there's an altar, there's some very nice

stained glass, that's very pretty, and then they leave.

What you miss by doing that is, you don't get to dwell in the place

Somebody at the pub just told me that tonight is supposed to be

So that's good, as I head into my unheated church room

So I've just got into bed and it's quite comfy, actually.

I'm quite cosy, given how cold it is, and I can see my breath.

I'm going to try and go to sleep now and try to forget I'm entirely

It is quite cold, it's quite noticeably cold.

I think there's a jolly good reason that champing is only done

during the summer because these old churches don't have

nice central heating, but it's oddly peaceful, actually.

Deciding to come champing in the dead of winter

I thought you might want some coffee.

You are my favourite person in the world.

Brilliant, and some bacon sandwiches as well.

I mean, it's the middle of winter, when you don't

Well, I was going to say, there is a reason why we run

champing from spring to the end of summer.

But how about the atmosphere and the experience?

I tell you what, I was surprised actually because I'm quite a scardy

cat, but really the second I sort of actually settled down to sleep,

You're lying there and there's no sound from outside

and the atmosphere was surprisingly quiet, sort of calm,

all through the night I had no moment of being,

The champing season starts around mid-March, a far more sensible time

Bookings cost around ?40 a head, but for that you get a historic

So if you're thinking of heading to south-east

England in the near future, here are some things

There are May Day events happening all over the country,

but one of our picks is the Jack in the Green Festival

Four days of folk dancing and music culminates in a wild costumed

The roots of this go way back, to the 16th and 17th Centuries.

Those clear spring days should be an ideal time to try to out

the world's thinnest tall building, Brighton's i360.

It only opened last year on the city's seafront,

marking the entrance to the old iconic West Pier

And in Hampshire, events are planned throughout the year to mark

the 200th anniversary of the death of the Pride and Prejudice

The main focus for events is in June, but even

now there are exhibitions, tours and performances taking place

Our global gourmet heads to Andalucia to take

in a festival that shows, like no other, just how much

Ben continues his trip around Sudan, this time, it's safe to say he's

You grab the arms, you grab the legs.

I think you need to get them on their back and then you win.

The Travel Show, your essential guide wherever you're heading.

Welcome to the slice of the show that tackles your travel questions.

Coming up, a heated discussion about Dubai in July.

But first, skiers heading for Winter Park, in the American Rockies,

The Winter Park Express runs from Denver's Union Station every

One way fares, for the two-hour trip, range from $39 to $59 with no

extra fees for skis or snowboards and there are easy connections

at Union Station with the new railink

Next, Neil Smurdon faces an eight hour stop over at Hong Kong Airport

So long as you have a passport from one of 160 approved countries,

including almost every nation in Europe and many in Asia

Make sure your bags are tagged to your final destination,

then you won't need to wait around at the baggage reclaim,

you can go straight through passport control into Hong Kong

without problem, just be ready to show your onward boarding pass

Then take advantage of the superb airport express train link direct

You'll need 100 Hong Kong dollars in cash rather than a credit card

Take the train to the last stop, on Hong Kong Island,

where you'll emerge beside one of the world's great harbours ready

for a few hours of exploration and eating before the 24-minute trip

Rich and Tara Ballard are looking ahead to summer and,

fortunately, contacted The Travel Show

Stay away from the Gulf in summer, unless you're

One July I was flying via Dubai and made the mistake of building

in a day to go sightseeing, the 40 degrees plus

I resorted to flagging down taxis just to travel a few hundred meters

in order to get some brief air conditioned respite.

Sure, there are plenty of chilled indoor attractions,

but that's not the point of a dazzling city such as Dubai.

I enjoy the Gulf States from November to February,

but during the remaining eight months of the year you'll

Sharri Rendall is heading to Tel Aviv in the last week

in April for a friend's 40th birthday.

Late spring is an excellent time to be in Tel Aviv.

It's a beautiful, welcoming cosmopolitan city which,

despite being barely a century old, has loads to see.

Exploring beyond Tel Aviv is easy, notably on the spectacular train

ride through the Judaean Hills to Jerusalem, taking 80-minutes

for just 20 shekels, which is about ?4 or $5.

Travelling as a single woman presents no special risks though

the danger of terrorism is ever present.

Whether you're considering the Balkans, the Baltic or Bogota,

The Travel Show is here to help, so email your question

and I'll do my very best to find you an answer.

From me, Simon Calder, the global guru, bye

Finally this week, we're back on the road in Sudan.

It's a country scarred by conflict and largely

inaccessible for tourists, but with a bit of resolve

and some careful planning it is possible to get there.

Last time, Benjamin Zand explored some of the country's impressive

Archaeological sites, this week he's in the capital

Khartoum trying something a little more hands on.

Every Friday at 4.00pm, in Haj Yusef, Khartoum,

this ancient sport, originally thought up by Nubian pharaohs,

For thousands of years, wrestling has been practised among the tribes.

But it is not just a game. As unrest pushes people away from

their homeland, the sport has found another home in the capital. And it

is a huge event. Things are heating up here, these guys going pretty

hard. Basically anybody can get involved, they have an empty arena,

and all the kids jump in and wrestle each other, and anyone can try it. I

should broadly out but I don't know. After seeing how heated the matches

can get I was happy I was only a spectator. But quickly I realise the

organisers had other plans. I was told an international exhibition

match was going to take place, one between Saddam and Britain, --

Sudan. And I was going to be representing Britain. Wrestling a

guy in front of 2000 people is a bit less than what I usually go for. He

is kind of scary. I was given the chance to meet my opponent. I am

kind of scared. Then it was time to head out into the arena.

I've got my knee braces on, time to lose my life.

I've got my knee braces on, time to lose my life.

I actually don't know what the rules are.

It actually started quite well, that's until my opponent took

off his shirt in a display of ultimate warrior

I spent the duration of the match running away from the opponent.

I learnt later that you're not really meant to move backwards,

only forwards, but they let me off as I was knew it and they probably

As things heated up, I used my premium agility skills,

dodged my opponent's attempts to bring me down.

With the crowd on my side, I decided to go in for the kill.

As it was all over, I was happy I could now retreat to the changing

room and think about what I'd just attempted, but in a celebration

of British-Sudanese relations, my opponent decided a parade around

Whilst in the arms of my new Sudanese comrade,

I had time to reflect on what I was seeing.

Sudan is a very divided country when it comes to things

like religion and ethnicity, but here, in the wrestling arena,

Even a young lad from Liverpool can earn respect.

Now it's all finished, all I can say is, this could be

a bit of a daunting place to walk into, but, after that experience,

and the love everyone showed me, all I can

And a cheering crowd as well, I'm being carried around.

Well, that's all we've got time for in this week's Travel Show.

Six years after the disastrous meltdown at Japan's Fukishima

nuclear plant, Carmen heads for the slopes nearby to find out

In the meantime, if you'd like to keep up with what we're

up to out on the road, you can sign up to our

But for now, from me, Christa Larwood, and the rest

of the Travel Show team here in south-east

Well, Friday was a much quieter and calmer day than what Thursday

brought, thanks to Storm Doris, but as we head into the weekend

We have loads of weather systems, weather fronts, I should say,

ganging up on us, bringing bouts of rain, and isobars tighten up