After a trip to Brownsea Island in 1818, George, the Prince Regent declared "'I had no idea I had such a delightful spot in my kingdom'. It may only be 1.5 miles long and 0.75 miles wide but this 500 acre island is full of history, mystery and wildlife. Felicity Evans takes a boat across and meets Claire Dixon of The National Trust, who took over the island in 1963. As Claire explains, many previous inhabitants have left their mark on Brownsea. Colonel Waugh and his wife Mary were walking along ...
Nov 27, 2014•24 min
Felicity Evans visits Steart Marshes on Somerset's Steart Peninsular just as the sea wall is breached to transform this landscape. Rising sea levels are putting the squeeze on wildlife along the coast and also leaving coastal villages under threat of flooding, but earlier this year, The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (The WWT) and the Environment Agency began the creation of the UK's largest new wetland reserve. The sea wall was purposely breached to create an inter-tidal range that will see the de...
Nov 20, 2014•24 min
Where can you find a hill that looks like an Inca monument but which is in fact an old nitroglycerin factory? The answer can be found in the Lee Valley, a green and watery wedge that grows and flows from Hertfordshire and Essex through northeast London to The River Thames. Occupying a liminal space between rural countryside and the industrial, the Lee Valley presents a surprising landscape - where nature has come back reclaim the monuments of an industrial past. Helen Mark travels down the Lee V...
Nov 13, 2014•24 min
Felicity Evans visits the autumnal orchards of Herefordshire and discovers how centuries of cider production have shaped this landscape. For at least 350 years there has been cider production in this area and there are over 800 orchards across the Wye Valley, which make a significant contribution to the beautiful countryside. Norman Stanier's family have lived in this area for generations and are deeply rooted ('scuse the pun') in the apple industry here. He shares his passion for this landscape...
Nov 06, 2014•24 min
As Open Country returns for a new series, Helen Mark ventures to The Isle of Sheppey where she becomes immersed both in the marsh swathed landscape of Elmley Nature Reserve and the infectious enthusiasm of the man who oversaw its creation. Elmley is the only National Nature Reserve in the UK to be managed by a farming family and this unique status is down to the forward thinking of farmer Philip Merricks. Bumping along the ridge of the reserve's sea wall in his trusty 4x4, Philip introduces Hele...
Oct 30, 2014•24 min
"Strange and beautiful, a heart shaped place between two rivers" is how television playwright and author, Dennis Potter described the Forest of Dean, where he grew up. On the 20th anniversary of his death, Felicity Evans explores the landscape that shaped much of his work. The Forest has a rich industrial heritage which Forester and Freeminer, Rich Daniels explains at the former site of the New Fancy coal mine. The old spoil heap now provides spectacular views across the Forest. In the distance,...
Sep 11, 2014•24 min
A young boy - John Muir - spent his early years in Scotland, playing along Dunbar's coast and scrambling across rocks. This early fascination with nature and 'wild places' later saw him campaign to protect them. When his family emigrated to the USA it led him on a path that would see him appeal directly to the president and help create the National Parks. Today he's known by most American schoolchildren but he is not so widely known in the UK. Helen Mark sets off on the new coast to coast John M...
Sep 04, 2014•25 min
Helen Mark visits one of the Isle of Wight's great attractions, those famous chalk cliffs, The Needles, at the western end of the island. These iconic white stacks march out to sea, back towards the Dorset coast, that they used to be joined to a mere 10,000 years ago. Tony Tutton of the National Trust shares the great views across the Solent with Helen, describing how treacherous the waters beneath them can sometimes be to competing sailors, and how vicious the winds can be. Helen also unpicks a...
Aug 28, 2014•24 min
Look at any map of the district around Northwich in Cheshire and you'll see that it's dotted with numerous lakes, called flashes. What have these got to do with salt? Felicity Evans is astonished to learn that they've been created by the unregulated extraction of rock salt, which has been exploited for industrial as well as culinary purposes since the 1700s. We'll hear that salt crystals were evaporated from brine in huge pans at numerous salt works across the county, the firewood for which saw ...
Aug 21, 2014•24 min
Revered by fly fishermen, Helen Mark visits the famous chalk streams of Hampshire and Wiltshire to find out about their particular ecology. With their trademark gravel beds and gin-clear waters, chalk streams are one of the very few habitats that are almost entirely exclusive to England. Helen begins at Salisbury's Harnham Water Meadows, close to the city's cathedral, with its well known limestone spire, from the spot where Constable painted his view of the scene. She hears that the meadows act ...
Aug 14, 2014•24 min
As the Cadbury family sought to expand their growing chocolate business in the late 19th century they also developed their vision for a better quality of life for the people of Birmingham. Buying 300 acres of land they created a model village they called Bournville, helping people escape the slums to good quality housing with gardens and fruit trees, green open spaces, churches and sports facilities. Today the Trust that runs the estate has expanded it to a thousand acres and residents often spe...
Aug 07, 2014•25 min
Snowdonia's slate once roofed the world, employing thousands of workers across scores of mines in North Wales. But that was in its heyday, in Victorian times. Today, whilst the industry still exists, it employs just 350 people. Helen Mark finds out what's become of the abandoned slate quarries and caverns today. Some are now places of leisure, with zip wires above ground, trampolines in underground slate caverns, and with scuba diving opportunities in flooded quarries, but others, as Helen disco...
Jul 31, 2014•24 min
How did people live on the land 2,000 years ago, during the Iron Age? Helen Mark finds out when she visits Butser Ancient Farm near Petersfield in Hampshire, very much a living experiment in practical archaeology. Founded 42 years ago by Peter Reynolds, Helen hears that Butser still operates as a kind of laboratory that looks into how our ancestors lived. For example, Butser's thatched roundhouses are built according to the exact dimensions found at digs in the vicinity, along the wooded hills a...
Jul 24, 2014•25 min
Once, the Hafod estate near Aberystwyth was one of Wales' most popular attractions, but that was 200 years ago. Then the grand stately home burnt down, and by 1950 the landscaped grounds (inspired by visions of classical Italy - unlikely as that might sound, given the extremely high annual rainfall in mid-Wales!) had fallen into disrepair, off the map, and out of the guidebooks. That's when the Forestry Commission bought the estate and planted it with conifers. As Felicity Evans finds out, in re...
Jul 17, 2014•24 min
"Turn right at the psychedelic hay barn". The new landmark is easy to spot and has brought a smile and a surprise to many passing through Newton Stewart. The British landscape has inspired thousands of artists and Helen Mark travels through Dumfries and Galloway to see how teams of street artists have been working on 'rural murals' adorning old hay barns, slurry tankers and horse coats offered up by locals as a new canvas. While they may divide opinion, those on the Mull of Galloway say it's hel...
Jul 10, 2014•25 min
With the whole of Yorkshire gearing up to welcome the pelotons of the Tour de France, Helen Mark heads for the scene of Le Grand Depart in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. Travelling at a somewhat slower pace than the Yellow Jerseys, she soaks up some of the history of this beauty spot in 'God's Own County'. The first stop is to Aysgarth Falls, a cascading flight of tumbling waterfalls carved out by the River Ure. National Parks Ranger Cathy Bergs tells us about the geology of the 'triple fall...
Jul 03, 2014•25 min
Helen Mark visits Coquet Island, a sanctuary for some of Britain's rarest nesting sea birds. It's also home to the world's first 'puffin piano'... Coquet Island is an RSPB reserve which due to the rarity of some of its winged visitors, is protected under European Law and no-one is allowed to set foot on it without special permission. There's no running water and no mains electricity, but every summer a small, dedicated team of wardens and volunteers lead by Paul Morrison take up residence on Coq...
May 15, 2014•25 min
With the growing Formula 1 schedule and following, there's an increasing appetite for motor racing. Helen Mark heads to Weybridge in Surrey to visit Brooklands - claimed to be the world's first purpose-built motor racing circuit to hear how one Hugh Locke-King's passion for speed led him to have the track designed and built on his land, almost bankrupting him. The site was used for land speed records even before the first race and also became a centre for aviation development. It reached its hey...
May 08, 2014•25 min
With Brunel's iconic Clifton Suspension Bridge towering over head, pull on your hiking boots and join Felicity Evans as she steps away from Bristol's busy city streets and delves into the dense undergrowth of the Avon Gorge. As a haven for rare plant species, it's been classed as one of the top three botanical sites in England and with peregrine falcons circling overhead and goats roaming the land below, you could be forgiven for thinking you are in the most wild of rural landscapes - but in rea...
May 01, 2014•25 min
Without quite walking on water, Helen Mark uses a very low spring tide to walk between Tresco and Bryher, two of the Isles of Scilly. She meets people who delight in what is revealed on the seabed, such as 3,000 year old Neolithic field walls, indicating the time when the islands were a single landmass. Local harbour master Henry Birch stands with Helen at the mid point between the islands which normally sits 5 meters below the sea. Helen hears how it's all possible because of what must surely b...
Apr 24, 2014•25 min
Helen Mark visits the Derwent Valley, an area dotted with old, looming cotton mill structures to discover what the future holds for these 'industrial giants' of the landscape. At the turn of the 19th Century, Britain was world leader in cotton manufacturing and home to the largest industrial complexes on the planet. The last spinning machines closed in 2003 and the UK now produces zero amount of cotton, but the awesome brick structures still tower over the Derbyshire Countryside. Stretching 15 m...
Apr 17, 2014•24 min
Felicity Evans visits the waterfalls and swallow holes at the western end of the Brecon Beacons, and discovers that besides its natural beauty, it's an area with a rich industrial heritage. Today its deep, mossy ravines are of great interest to walkers and potholers. But the waterfalls, Felicity discovers, gave rise to local industries - including a gunpowder works, and the silica mines provided firebricks that were shipped around the world. She even walks behind one of the waterfalls, Sgwd Y Ei...
Apr 10, 2014•24 min
We might think we know the Peak District quite well, but in reality it has many secrets and many stories still to tell, such as its connection with British Imperial India. Helen Mark travels with National Park Ranger Chamu Kuppuswamy as they discover the Indian heritage tucked amongst the wild hills of The Peak District National Park.
Apr 03, 2014•25 min
Helen Mark travels to Chelford Cattle Market in Cheshire, along with hundreds of buyers and sellers from across the UK. It was first formed over a century ago and has weathered the storms of the foot and mouth outbreak and BSE crisis which resulted in many others closing down altogether. It still nestles on the edge of the village of Chelford, next to the station, as livestock used to be delivered by rail. Like many others though, it has plans to move out to newer facilities closer to the motorw...
Mar 27, 2014•25 min
For thirty years, the arts and environment organisation Common Ground has used Dorset as a kind of laboratory for its work celebrating local distinctiveness, before rolling their projects out elsewhere around the UK. Helen Mark hears from Common Ground co-founder Sue Clifford why they began Apple Day events near her home in Shaftesbury, as a way of celebrating and protecting old apple orchards. Helen also meets the sculptor Peter Randall-Page who was commissioned to carve some small wayside scul...
Feb 06, 2014•25 min
Helen Mark visits the small Gloucestershire village of Adlestrop that inspired Edward Thomas' famous eponymous poem when his steam train unexpectedly stopped there 100 years ago, on the eve of war. Helen meets Ian Morton of the Edward Thomas Fellowship to find out more about the poet who died in combat in 1917, as well as people who live and work in this beautiful corner of the Cotswolds. She visits Daylesford, the nearby large organic farm operation, makers of their own Adlestrop cheese, and he...
Jan 30, 2014•24 min
Helen Mark explores the aviation heritage of Lincolnshire, a county criss-crossed with former airfields, and finds out how they are being used today. She visits Woodhall Spa's airfield, once home to the Dambusters squadron and until recently, a sand and gravel quarry. Bordered by nature reserves, the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust aim to buy the airfield and return it to the heathland it once was, as described by local Victorian naturalist, Joseph Burdett-Davey. Evidence of its past remains in the ...
Jan 23, 2014•24 min
The Falkland estate in rural Fife is very different to traditional family-owned estates in Scotland. Felicity Evans meets Ninian Stuart, who is using his inheritance to increase public access to the woods and fields that make up this 1,900 hectare estate, which is 35 miles north of Edinburgh. She hears how Ninian's set up the Centre for Stewardship which actively involves schools, playgroups and many others in Fife's wider community to make the most of the estate's varied landscape. It's a forme...
Jan 16, 2014•24 min
Helen Mark goes to Strangford Lough, one of the richest marine environments within the United Kingdom, to meet the people who love its isolation and beauty. She talks to Michael Faulkner who moved to Islandmore on the Lough after his business collapsed. For him and his wife, living alone on the island was a time to reflect. This was also the place Michael's father escaped to for family holidays. He was Brian Faulkner, the last Prime Minister of Northern Ireland from 1971-72, who presided over so...
Jan 09, 2014•24 min
The Battle of Flodden was a turning point in the history of the UK, setting the stage for the subsequent Union of the Crowns between Scotland and England in 1603. The border village of Branxton lays claim to having the "smallest visitor centre in the world". Housed in a converted telephone box, this unique project - dedicated to the Battle of Flodden - is the brain child of Clive Hallam-Baker a battle expert who lives just opposite. Flodden was the largest battle fought between England and Scotl...
Jan 02, 2014•24 min
