SIMON REEVE, ADVENTURER, TV PRESENTER AND AUTHOR

Where is it?

Symi, Greece.

Why do you go there?

It is gorgeous, a bit off-the-beaten track and has the finest harbour in the eastern Mediterranean – possibly the whole Mediterranean. All the buildings around the main harbour are neoclassical, so it looks fancy, but it is earthy and homely as well.

What I love most is that you can still go to a restaurant there and they will say: "Come on into the kitchen". Grandma is there with four giant vats on the old stove cooking up food. She lifts the lids off and wafts the food smells in your direction.

How often do you go?

Every other year.

How did you discover it?

My wife Anya took me there. She insisted we went when we first started dating. She told me it was part of her life and it needed to be part of mine too.

Anya is the perfect guide because she has been going since she was 14. She had been in Greece on holiday with her mum and dad when they got on the wrong ferry and ended up on Symi. They decided to cancel their return trip and stayed for the rest of the summer.

The Herald: Adventurer Simon Reeve. Picture: Westley HargraveAdventurer Simon Reeve. Picture: Westley Hargrave

Anya has since learned fluent Greek. She knows everybody on Symi. Walking about the town with her is like being with a celebrity.

What's your favourite memory?

Anya and I went to a friend's wedding in Istanbul and afterwards we took a train across Turkey to Greece, then caught a ferry to Symi.

We walked to our favourite beach on the island, over this hill in the searing sun. It was beautiful. I said: "Let's do a photo". I set my digital camera up, put it on record, then went down on one knee and proposed to her.

Who do you take?

Anya and our 10-year-old son Jake. We have taken most of our friends and family to Symi. We went for my 40th birthday a few years ago with a group of about 30. Maybe one day we will retire there.

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What do you take?

Inflatable pool toys, full-face snorkel masks and swim shorts. A little fire-starting kit for when we go camping up in the mountains. A shirt or two. Teabags.

What do you leave behind?

Our dogs. That is difficult. Hopefully they can come someday. Also the damp weather of Dartmoor in Devon where I live. Problems, cares and concerns.

Sum it up in five words.

Secluded. Hot. Rugged. Food. Harbour.

What other travel spot is on your wish list?

South America. I was filming a new series travelling the length of South America and when we came out of the Amazon jungle, the pandemic was raging like a wildfire.

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We came home to plan the next bit of the journey and remind our families we existed, but then never went back. I would love to complete that unfinished business. I have my bags packed.

Journeys To Impossible Places by Simon Reeve is published by Hodder, out now, priced £20