HE has swum with great
white, bull, great hammerhead, mako and tiger sharks, caught king
cobras, black mambas and lanceheads, had a redback spider crawl
across his hand and was bitten by a caiman whilst searching for
anaconda in an Argentinian swamp. He even learned how to dance on BBC
TV's Strictly Come Dancing.
Now naturalist, extreme
mountaineer, adventurer and kids' TV favourite, Steve Backshall is
gearing up for a new challenge - a tour in which he will be visiting
towns across England imparting his considerable knowledge of nature,
wildlife and his passion for the subjects.
Wild World, which will
accompany the release of Shark Seas’- the fourth book in his Falcon
Chronicles series of children’s novels, will feature a stop at the
Churchill Theatre in Bromley.
And it's clear when we
chat that Steve can't wait to be back on stage and entertain his
legion of fans.
"I'm really
excited to be back at Bromley," he says cheerfully. "I was
there about five years ago on a previous tour and it's so close to
home that it's nice to be on home turf for a change.
"We always have a
really good time so I'm looking forward to it."
And an element of the
show that he looks forward to particularly is the Q&A - which can
yield all manner of questions.
"I never do a tour
without a good amount of audience participation and so all my shows
are fully interactive," he says.
"The audience gets
a chance to grill me and ask any question they like which I love.
"They are always
great and encompass a huge range of topics such as how did the
giraffe get a really long neck and do polar bears get lonely.
"Some are really
easy to answer and some are a bit tricky - like who would win in a
fight between a polar bear and a great white?
"Others are
completely off the wall and random. Once recently a young boy asked
me what was evolution - that was the worst one because I made the
terrible mistake of trying to explain it but 10 minutes in I realised
I was failing badly!
"The thing is if
you want to stump me it's pretty easy because the natural world is so
amazing and has millions of different species so if you ask me
something about a specific water flea for example I wouldn't have a
clue," he laughs.
"But I like that
because I get to go away and read up on it and learn something new."
Tough questions aside
Wild World will be filled with loads of fantastic stories about his
all too numerous to mention adventures to the world's wildest places
and the creatures that inhabit them.
There will also be
exclusive behind the scenes content and unseen footage from some of
his TV shows such as Deadly 60, including some "very close
calls". There might even be some chat about his books and
children's novels.
Cheerful and chatty -
and every bit as friendly as you would expect - Steve says he feels
"exceptionally lucky" to have what he says is the best job
in the world.
His passion for
wildlife started at a young age when he would go out into the garden
and get up close to the creatures in it.
"It wasn't
anything hugely dramatic and exotic," he says. "I was just
lucky be able to explore my back yard and be surrounded by heathland
where I was able to build camps and rope swings and see animals such
as snakes in the compost and deer.
"Every single part
of it had me excited from an early age and I'm so lucky."
Since then of course he
has graduated to slightly more extreme adventures and in nearly 20
years he has taken part in some dramatic and dangerous expeditions
and come up close with some fiercesome creatures.
And he says there is
still more he wants to do.
"I'm about to go
white water kayaking which is something I've been wanting to do for
about 20 years," he says. "That will be fun and exciting.
"However, the more
you travel the more you see and you realise that in 1,000 lifetimes
you still wouldn't see everything.
"The scariest
things was when I went diving for crocodiles in Botswana and fell
face first into a hippo," he chuckles.
"It was such a
surprise because we didn't know the hippo was there - if we had known
we wouldn't have done it. So that was the most frightening thing. But
looking back the hippo was a young animal - had he been fully grown
we probably wouldn't have made it out alive but lucky for me it was
more intimidated by me than I was of it."
And then he tells me
about some of his other incredible encounters such as swimming with
great white sharks, trekking through the rainforest and extreme
mountaineering.
"It's an amazing
privilege," he adds. "But in most cases these animals I
come across are much more frightened of me than I am of them.
"I know I'm safe
because in most situations they would much rather give me a wide
berth and move away.
"However there
have been some heartstopping moments along the way but we put an
enormous amount of work in to try and make sure these situations are
few and far between.
"Besides life is a
risk - being in London with all those cars is a risk as you could end
your life at any second but you learn to find ways to make yourself
safe and it's the same in the natural world."
And then he's back to
chatting about the tour which starts in October.
"I love touring
and normally I go all over the country but October is going to be a
bit busy so we've decided to scale it down a bit."
Indeed he has a small
matter of a wedding to organise - that of his own to Olympic rower
Helen Glover who he will be cheering on at the Olympic Games in Rio
this summer.
And if you think he's
going on a "normal" honeymoon, think again.
"Helen has done a
lot of travelling but she wants to go on an expedition and so I'm
taking her to the Sea of Cortez in Mexico and go diving with sea
lions. She's also going to learn to scuba dive and then we are going
to the desert looking for snakes.
"The place where I
went swimming with sharks is quite close to where we are going in
Mexico and it was an option for the honeymoon but I didn't think
Helen's father would be too impressed," he laughs.
And the answer to who
would win in a fight between a polar bear and a great white? You will
have to go and see him to find out!
Steve Backshall embarks
on his nationwide Wild World theatre tour from October 19 to November
20. He will be at the Churchill Theatre in Bromley on October 26. His
new children's novel 'Shark Seas' will be published in October.
Visit
http://www.stevebackshall.com/tour to book tickets.
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