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Walking Through History(2013)
March 30, 20133 Seasons · 16 Episodes
Ended
Documentary
2.5from 1 users
Overview
Tony Robinson goes for a walk through some of Britain's beautiful and historic landscapes.
Network Channel 4
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Tony Robinson goes for a walk through some of Britain's beautiful and historic landscapes.
2013
Walking between Bronte family places and meeting people knowledgeable about the family. This is a long walk, finishing in Haworth, visiting places from the novels and used in real life by the Bronte family.
This walk explores the Victorianisation of Deeside.
Pembrokeshire Coastal Path provides a start but the walk soon leaves the route and heads inland. The conquest by Norman barons in to southern Wales is explained.
On 30th June 1940 a plane full of German soldiers touched down at Guernsey airport. It was the start of 5 years of occupation. The traditional image of the Channel Islands is sun, sea and sandy beaches. But Tony embarks on a 5 day walk to explore the darkest chapter in the Islands' history, which 70 years on is itself becoming a tourist draw. Starting out in Guernsey to uncover memories of the German aerial attack on the port and the invasion itself, Tony voyages to Jersey which is littered with physical reminders of the Nazi presence.
The presenter walks over 3 days joining together King John's connections in the Midlands to the Magna Carta.
England's Last Battle - West Country. In 1685, a rebel army landed at the pretty Dorset port of Lyme Regis and swept up through Somerset, pausing at Taunton to declare its leader, Duke of Monmouth, the rightful king.
2013
Tony heads off for a 45-mile walk across Wiltshire to tell the story of life and death in the last centuries of the Stone Age. His route over chalk downlands and Salisbury plain takes him through the greatest concentration of prehistoric sites in Europe. - I forgot to change over the times and lost the beginning of this.
It was 30 years after the Romans invaded Britain that they were ready to take on the challenge of conquering the Lake District. With the toughest landscape they had encountered in the country, peopled by a rebellious tribe, it was no small task. Tony Robinson tackles the journey, but, as he discovers on this 50-mile walk from Penrith past Ullswater to Ambleside and on to the Irish Sea at Ravenglass, the Romans encountered beauty and danger in equal measure.
In the late 18th century there was a sure-fire way to earn a living along the Cornish coast: smuggling. The tiny secretive harbours, beaches and secluded coves were ideal for the infamous illicit imports: brandy for the parson, tobacco for the clerk... It's also great walking country, as Tony discovers in his four-day trek along the stunning coastline between Plymouth and Falmouth.
The presenter walks along the Leeds Liverpool canal. Uncovering its impact and building.
The 1990s St Cuthbert Way stretches from Melrose to Lindisfarne and could have been the route taken by monks. Following the route over four days, showing the bringing of Christianity to Northumbria.
Tony Robinson travels along the beautiful North Norfolk coast, examining why it was so unaffected by the dynamic Victorian developments that changed other parts of the country so much.
Tony Robinson
Narrator
2013
Appealing to history buffs and ramblers alike, in this new four-part series Tony Robinson embarks on spectacular walks through some of Britain's most historic landscapes in search of the richest stories from Britain's past. In each programme, Tony follows a bespoke route that allows him to explore on foot both the history of a particularly colourful historical period or event, and the spectacular landscape in which those events unfolded. The walks are proper expeditions, with each one taking Tony a week.
Tony's walk in this episode takes him back to 1940 when Dorset became the unlikely frontline in the war against Hitler. His five-day, 60-mile walk along the Jurassic coast reveals the county's hidden World War II story. Starting by the defences on Chesil Beach (still standing 70 years on), Tony's journey encompasses stunning scenery and amazing acts of ingenuity and bravery as he heads east towards Swanage and Studland Bay. He uncovers the strange part a world-famous swannery played in developing a secret weapon. He hears of the bravery of the man who won the Victoria Cross serving in Portland Harbour when it became one of the first places in Britain to be bombed by the Germans. He reveals the role Dorset had to play in protecting Britain from invasion, and in an emotional climax he meets one of the veterans who survived after landing on Omaha Beach on D Day.
Tony sets off on a 45 mile hike through the beautiful countryside of the Weald in Kent and the Downs of East Sussex to discover the area's rich and surprising Tudor heritage. At the impressively preserved Penshurst Place, author Philippa Gregory helps Tony relish the fate of the Grand Duke of Buckingham at the hands of the young Henry VIII. From there, he travels up what used to be secret paths to Hever Castle. Henry's saucy courting of the Boleyn girls at Hever comes as perhaps no surprise, but Tony travels on to find out how the monarch's reign brought not just fame and disaster to the women who caught his eye, but also wrought huge social, political, and industrial change to the country - and especially this area.
Tony takes on a tough four-day trek through the Kintail region of the west Scottish Highlands to discover the story of the Jacobite uprisings of the early 1700s. On three occasions, Highland armies, assisted by the French and the Spanish, attempted to overthrow the King and put a Stuart back on the throne. What made the Highlands such a breeding ground for revolution and how did the unique character of this landscape shape the character of the Highlanders? Tony's journey of discovery starts in Shiel Bridge, at the mouth of Glen Shiel, where he heads to the site of the earliest known dwellings here, the 'skyscrapers' of the Iron Age. On to the village of Glenelg with its fantastic views over the Sound of Sleat to Skye... and the hulking remains of a British barracks built 200 years ago by George I to pacify and terrify the locals. Via the town of Kyle of Lochalsh, Tony reaches the stunning Eilean Donan Castle.
