Five Best Travel Documentaries and Series
With travel on hold for an indefinite amount of time and responsible members of societies around the world trying their hardest to physical distance themselves to help their friends, families and health care workers it's never been a better time to lay in bed and experience travel lazily and cheaply: through travel documentaries.
Here are some personal favourites of my mine to tide anyone over and give you plenty of ideas for what to explore when the world returns to some sense of normalcy.
Travel Man
It’s painfully difficult not to love Richard Ayoade. When you combine Richard and some of the world’s funniest people exploring basically every fantastic city in the most comedic way possible, it’s hard not to spit your food from laughter. Although the format is simple, chuck Richard and another comedian in a city for 48 hours, it is not your typical travel show. As a travel show that also makes fun of travel shows and tourism, it is a lesson in not taking travel too seriously and embracing its absurdities and letdowns (looking at you Effiel Tower). Every episode is brilliant, but the Moscow and Copenhagen episodes are true highlights.
2. Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown
It’s near impossible and possibly sacrilege to some not to include at least one Anthony Bourdain show on a list of the best travel or even food documentaries. Although all his shows are worth hunting down, it is this program that best blends culinary exploration with physical and cultural exploration. On a sadder note, it is also the last tv show Bourdain ever filmed. With a staggering twelve seasons, there is surprisingly not one horrible episode, however, Iran, Hanoi, Congo and Copenhagen are real highlights combining Bourdain’s love for food, travel and social and political commentary in perfect symmetry.
3. Dark Tourist
Dark tourism is nothing exceptionally new, however, in the age of social media and cheap travel, it is a growing trend and increasingly controversial. This series does little to make the extreme end of dark tourism look any less stretchy but is nevertheless a very entertaining ride, and that is cringe, confronting and funny at times. The first episode, which includes a tour that mocks an illegal border crossing from Mexico to the USA, is perhaps it is most confronting part of the series. Though confronting when combined with our knowledge of how travel contributes to climate change makes you question how ethical travel has become.
4. Jack Whitehall: Travels with My Father
Like Travel Man, Travels with My Father is fall from a serious travel show and isn’t really the show you want to watch if you are planning a trip for the future. However, it is one of the funniest shows on Netflix. The premise is Jack Whitehall, one of the poshest UK comedians, taking his even more posh father on a gap year adventure in South East Asia, a road trip through Eastern Europe and a road trip through the US. From the adoption of Winston Whitehall, a Luke Thep doll, to a visit to Romania’s head witch Travels with My Father is worth watching not only for the destinations they visit but also for the comedy of seeing two polar opposites thrown together.
5. Joanna Lumley’s Nile
As one part of perhaps one of the best comedy duos in TV history, Joanna is a goddess worth watching travel anywhere. This series, one of just many travel series’ she has made over the years, sees her travelling from the very well treaded Egypt to four of the least touristy countries in the world, Ethiopia, Sudan, South Sudan and Uganda. As well as being obviously funny, there is something incredibly soothing about listening and watching Joanna travel down the Nile and visit some of the least explored but beautiful natural and man-made wonders in the world.