16/01/2016 The Travel Show

This is what you see every single day.

Welcome to the Travel Show, coming to you this week from Kenya.

We are travelling here to get some face time with some of the

I am off to one of the lesser-known parts to find out how it arguably

became the birthplace of organised conservation in Africa.

Let's start this week about 5000 feet off the ground

In African terms, Amboseli National Park is quite small,

But be under no illusions, this outpost not far from the border of

There are many different types of conservation efforts happening

all around Africa, but not many people know that

a lot of them are intertwined with tourism, so if tourism is hurting,

Be in no doubt, tourism here has been suffering.

Militant attacks along the Kenyan coast prompted a raft of countries,

including the US and the UK, to warn its citizens

Most of those advisories have now been lifted but

The first five months of this year, tourism was 25% down on 2014.

When you come to wildlife conservation,

a lot of it depends on revenue from tourism, and if tourism goes down it

means some of the directives that are supposed to be implemented may

Katito works for the Amboseli Trust for Elephants,

which claims their work over the past 40 years has profoundly changed

the way we think of elephants, from how they behave in their habitat and

The sun is just coming down, Kilimanjaro is just over there

on the right, we are surrounded by an amazing herd of elephants.

This is what you see every single day.

That is why I have been studying elephants for the past 20 years,

With this family, we want to make sure everyone is here.

There are 52 elephant families in this park, and Katito knows most

Part of her job is to do a regular census

This place must be heaven for animals.

It is, when I started there were 750 elephants,

I cannot complain about poaching here, it is not bad.

Compared to other places in Kenya, this is the best place.

The reason why is because of the work that we do.

Crossing fingers, we hope everything will work well,

It is a similar story for another antipoaching arrangement,

the Big Life Foundation, whose rangers have arrested more

When tourism drops because of unforeseen circumstances,

A couple of lodges, not all of them, but they pay a percentage

We need to find other ways to keep our operation running.

It is a pretty costly business, so every cent counts.

It looks like recently in the past couple

of months it has started to climb, and we hope it will recover next

Some say visitor numbers are already beginning to recover,

which could be thanks in part to some of those damaging

We have about four trucks lined up on this road, very busy indeed.

A few wildebeest out there, but all the tourists here are

fanatical about their photography, any wildlife at all.

They have thousands of dollars worth of lenses, I suppose that is one

Locals have been asked to play a part as well,

Even small jobs now could have ramifications into the future.

Take this primary school right on the edge of the park.

The next generation of rangers and guides will come

I have been asked to judge their wildlife warrior poster competition.

Lions have become the most endangered species.

The winners are given a game drive and a chance to visit

It is funded by money from tourism concerns.

The idea behind the scholarship programme is that these people

will finish their secondary school education and they will

We want the cycle to continue once we have gone,

They will take our places and continue educating

And eventually we will be talking about how much we have conserved.

If there is some good news here it is that everyone seems to get it.

Initiation rites that used to see big game slaughtered are now not

And some organisations are compensating farmers

for damage that wild animals cause to crops or livestock.

According to the Kenya Wildlife Service, the animal populations here

To the Meru National Park, a beautiful piece

Meru was also the home of two people who became the inspiration

behind much of the conservation work that goes on in East Africa today.

The subjects of a book and a Hollywood movie, they captured

Coming up later, I find out what legacy is left 50

years after filming Born Free right here in Kenya.

BBC Travel Show, your essential guide wherever you are headed!

Hello and welcome to Trending Travel, where we discover what is

BBC Travel Show, your essential guide wherever you are headed!

Hello and welcome to Trending Travel, where we discover what is

I will be bringing you essential videos and apps to take with you.

Let's start with our rundown of the top stories at have caught

A new pop-up alternative theme park in the UK,

masterminded by street artist Banksy, sent social media crazy.

Called Dismaland, it has installations by artists describing

social commentary, and was described as an sinister twist on Disneyland.

A call to boycott Kerala was on Facebook,

But authorities dispute any culling of stray dogs, and say they are

an animal friendly, pet-loving community.

A twist on Google Street View has put Japan's cat culture on the map.

The new project, called Cat Street View, shows a Japanese

In Turkey, the restoration of a castle raised

eyebrows among social media users who described its new look as

This survey looked at tens of thousands of tweets from around

the US to see who was more positive or negative about tourists.

The top tourist-loving city was found to be Chicago,

and while you might rightly expect people from places like New York or

Las Vegas to vent more negative feeling towards tourists, the most

This app allows people to create a long-range selfie.

This can click the shutter on the camera from as much

We love staying connected with you all online, and don't forget we are

You have been sending us some great things this month.

Pictures have been coming in from all over the world as many

of you in the northern hemisphere took summer holidays.

You can get involved on Tuesdays using this hashtag.

We especially like these from Ben, out in the morning.

You can send videos, like this one from Europe.

Now let's look at the viral videos for this month.

This video has had over 300,000 views, and really shows Los Angeles

He said a lot of time and passion, scouting locations, and waiting

Another video which took serious passion was this

one by Oliver Astrologo, called Roma which was watched

He dedicated months to capturing everyday moments, to show a day

And don't forget to check out our website for all the ways that

you can get in touch, or if you have seen anything online that you

This place is amazing for many reasons.

But right up there has to be its most famous four-legged

She was the inspiration behind the film Born Free,

The film, based on the lives of George and Joy Adamson, was based on

Joy Adamson's book, about training her to live safely in the wild.

Some people say that was the start of much of the conservation work

done here on the continent, and their legacy still lives on.

This is a very lightly visited park, but

Elephant, giraffe, buffalo, rhino, it is all here.

And this is one of the places Elsa the lioness lived for five years,

This is Elsa's last resting spot, very close to the river where George

first found her, and the last moments she spent before she died.

And, of course, Joy's ashes were scattered around here as well.

A lovely little oasis, under this beautiful tree.

The film of Elsa's life was shot, and was a sensation

It made stars of George and Joy, and the aftermath changed

One of the more obvious impacts was the beginning of some of Africa's

The Elsa Conservation Trust still runs a wildlife retreat

and conservation centre in Hell's Gate National Park, here in Kenya.

And the Born Free Foundation, launched by the film's two human

stars, Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers, operates around the world.

These are some of the snares that we have collected the last four months.

Here in Meru, it counts lions, hunts poachers, and clears

So what effect did the movie Born Free have on conservation

I think Born Free film is by far one of the most up-to-date

The specific story of the film touches me, and many

We continuously have to make it about who will continue doing what

Virginia has done all her life, and what George did.

And it is a continued inspiration for us.

Not only Born Free, across the conservation world.

After filming had finished, George made his way with the lions, and

To mark this place, there is not much here,

This park is virtually unchanged since George and Joy were here.

I'm really lucky, because we have come across a lioness and her cub.

They have just feasted, so this is the moment where they get

really lazy, nestled just below the lovely tree for some shade.

It kind of reminds you of what Elsa would have been doing here in

So, do you think this whole experience will spur you

Definitely, we can't wait to show my son that movie, because we have

Why do you think films like Born Free would inspire people to

come out into a kind of very harsh environment, to look

I think it shows you can be safe, if you follow the...

I mean, you put your trust in the drivers,

And the film definitely shows you that side of it.

George had this lovely call, never had to shout.

Of course, Joy and George needed helpers, and one of those was

He helped return the Born Free lions to the wild, but used to come back

They were relaxed, there was no tension, there were no issues.

We knew very well that they would walk up to us, and greet us

The pair used to sit under this tamarind tree, with warm beers.

It doesn't take long for the memories to come flooding back.

Just being with him, and being able to work with him,

and see how he absolutely handled his lions, and how relaxed he was.

And he had this amazing rapport with his environment.

He was totally in harmony with his environment.

So, with the 50th anniversary of the film coming up, the publicity

it sort of gets, it is going to have a surge in tourism for the area.

Anything to, first of all, try and remind the the legacy and

the legend, the Adamsons and Born Free, and especially for the park.

It will suddenly pick up, and I think the anniversary is a wonderful

way to relive this, and see for themselves the way it happened.

This is the Born Free country, this is where it all happened.

This is where Elsa was found, this is where Elsa was.

Well, that is pretty much it from Kenya.

Carmen will be heading for Japan, where in the city of Kyoto, a travel

company is offering women the chance to play the bride, when no-one else

And don't forget, if you want to follow us on all

of our travels, wherever we are in the world, in real-time, sign on

The details should be on your screens now.

But for me, Henry Golding, and the rest of the Travel Show team

Well, for most of us, it was a wet rather than white Christmas.

There was a little bit of snow over the hills of northern Britain, but