"I like animals. I like natural history. The travel bit is not the important bit. The travel bit is what you have to do in order to go and look at animals."

"Before the BBC, I joined the Navy in order to travel."

"I can mention many moments that were unforgettable and revelatory. But the most single revelatory three minutes was the first time I put on scuba gear and dived on a coral reef. It's just the unbelievable fact that you can move in three dimensions."

"In the old days... it was a basic, cardinal fact that producers didn't have opinions. When I was producing natural history programmes, I didn't use them as vehicles for my own opinion. They were factual programmes."

"It is the belief that extremes and excesses of inequality must be reduced so that each person is free to fully develop his or her full potential. This is why we take precious time out of our lives and give it to politics."

"I put instant coffee in a microwave oven and almost went back in time."

"We cannot be kind to each other here for even an hour. We whisper, and hint, and chuckle and grin at our brother's shame; however you take it we men are a little breed."

"To conquer fear is to realize that the only true currency in life is time well spent."