On Saturday 20th August 2016 James Curtis of Wildwing Honey was delighted to be asked to appear on Channel 5’s morning show called (funnily enough) ‘The Saturday Show’. Here he writes about the big day out from the apiary.
It was an early morning start getting out of bed at 4am having loaded the car up the night before with a display hive, frames of honey, a plastic tabletop extractor, jars of honey, bee suits and other items of cornucopia (including breakfast to have on-route). The journey to the studios in west London was a breeze at that time of the morning with the added excitement of venturing through some of the best sightseeing spots in London minus the tourists. Passing along Embankement, up through Trafalgar Square, along The Mall up to Buckingham Palace and dropping shortly after into the not so glamorous underbelly of the shopping center at the top of which was the studio. After being helped by someone from the studios team up in the lift with all the gear we made it for 6:30am for our dry run rehearsal. This wasn’t with Gaby or any of the other celebrities and involved me being shuffled around from position to position whilst they worked out the best angles. This only took five minutes or so. I met Gaby Roslin briefly before being plonked back into the green room where I met one of the other guests. He was a very good air guitarist.
After a bit of preparation of my kit I was ready to go. Now on my third coffee the caffeine was starting to kick in. After a quick trip to makeup to be painted with what felt like emulsion (although it made my face tone look incredibly even and was applied with great skill) the show went live. It was a bit weird watching a show on the tv in the green room that you can hear echoing down the corridor from the studio the next door. After sitting around a bit more I was sent for. During the ad break we had to set up all of the set – fake grass, plants, extractor, hive and all the other bits before the show went live again. All done in time I was placed in front of a looming black camera on wheels and told to wait for the red light. Ping. On came the light and I was off. The rest was a bit of a blur but really great fun. Unfortunately the catch up show has been removed from the Channel 5 on demand website (they remove it when the following weeks show has been recorded), so you cant watch my performance again. But here is a screenshot from sky plus to prove I was there!
The journey back from London wasn’t so easy. Traffic was monstrous by then but it was worth the trip. Hopefully I will be back on TV soon!
