Simon Reeve explores Ireland's culture, beliefs and history in new BBC show

Simon Reeve’s new BBC series has him staying closer to home than his usual locations, says Keeley Bolger

TV ADVENTURER Simon Reeve’s travel relics are macabre. As well as a sword from the Dayak tribe in Borneo, which was used to behead people, Reeve has added a “really heavy bolt” to his collection.

“It was thrown in my direction during a minor riot that happened after the July 12 ’marching season’ in Belfast,” he says. “Luckily, it missed me, but it would have ripped a giant hole, or at the least knocked me out. It could have done some nasty damage. It’s a nasty thing to be chucking around. Naughty, naughty, naughty, I would say.”

Like the sword, the bolt is kept at a safe distance from Reeve’s four-year-old son, Jake, in the family’s home in “the middle of nowhere” in Devon. Reeve’s wife, Anya, is a TV camerawoman. The memory of his recent amble around the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland is fresh in mind.

As personable and chatty off screen as he is on, Reeve delved into the region’s culture, beliefs and history for his new BBC Two documentary, Ireland With Simon Reeve.

“It came as a shock just how beautiful it is,” he says. “I feel a little bit ashamed. I travel for a living and I didn’t realise.”

He begins in the south, including visits to Cork and Croagh Patrick, before heading cross the border.

Reeve doesn’t judge the situations he encounters, but he was acutely aware of his duties when discussing the Troubles.

“I didn’t live through that situation,” says the London-born 43-year-old. “It didn’t affect my immediate family. I wasn’t an oppressed Catholic, I wasn’t a Protestant, fearful of the tide of change, so it’s very difficult to judge from outside.

“The responsibility is a big one and I’m sure we haven’t met it completely, but we did try.”

The son of a maths teacher, Reeve spent his teens as a post boy in a newspaper office, before becoming a reporter.

He wrote several books about terrorism, which led to TV spots, and he consequently landed work as a BBC presenter, making travel documentaries exploring the natural and human world.

There have been series on the Indian Ocean, Australia, the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn, as well as the equator. Next up is a programme on Greece.

Beeb @bbcpress says my new Ireland series is confirmed for @BBCTwo on 22 Nov at 8pm https://t.co/n7s3GiGRdD pic.twitter.com/6OcDBZeVGi

— Simon Reeve (@simon_reeve) November 9, 2015

Although, he says, he is rarely approached for photographs, he had an unusual encounter recently.

“Someone tried to stop me in the swimming baths for a picture, when I was trying to dry myself and my son,” he says. “I thought that was probably about as inappropriate as it gets. There were no negative vibes coming off them, they were just a bit pleased, so I tried to hide my son behind me and push him back into one of the lockers.

“When you’ve got a child with you, it’s funny how protective a person can get,” he says. “I go a little bit Viking when I’m with him, in terms of looking for danger and trying to protect the boy.”

A tight family unit, Reeve’s wife travelled with him as a camerawoman, before Jake was born.

When his day job involves dodging bullets in Mogadishu and entering drug dens in South Africa, it’s no wonder the family’s holidays are less intrepid. “Most of my time is spent looking for some method of soft play for my little son, and plotting how I’m going to get him in the water or out of the water,” says Reeve, who has circumnavigated the globe three times.

Camping with the lads... pic.twitter.com/Oic3o8OgDe

— Simon Reeve (@simon_reeve) November 1, 2015

Wherever he is, though, he carries the spirit of adventure.

“When I’m on holiday, I do try to think, ‘What is the craziest thing on this menu?’ It’s not usually eyeballs or penis soup, I grant you, but I still try the funny foreign food, whether I’m in Ireland or an island off Indonesia.

“Wherever it is, try some funny food, because it’s memorable and life’s short,” he says enthusiastically. “Use travel, and use your holidays and adventures, to rack up memories that will carry you through life.

“There are very few better ways to have extraordinary experiences that linger forever than travel — and travel now, because you have opportunities at the moment that our ancestors could only have dreamt about.”

Ireland With Simon Reeve begins on BBC Two on Sunday, November 22