Sue Perkins: Lost in Thailand

Sue Perkins: Lost in Thailand (2024- )

RunningReality showAdventure, Travel

Sue Perkins makes a triumphant return to Channel 5 with an incredible brand-new three-part series. Heading off the beaten track, Sue explores three regions of Thailand, meeting extraordinary people – and animals!

First, she heads north to Chiang Mai, kicking off her journey by abseiling from the wonderfully named Crazy Horse Buttress into a limestone cave deep underground. Next, on the island of Phuket she helps to clear detritus from a coral reef: 'litter picking does not get any better than this!' In Bangkok she pops into a Buddhist Hell Garden to explore the potential wages of sin, has a driving lesson on an electric tuk-tuk in a monsoon and picks the world's most aromatic coconut with secateurs 20 feet above her head. Not scary at all.

As she travels across Thailand she meets extraordinary animals too. Sue learns to sing lullabies to recovering elephants and discovers the secrets of a gibbon ‘love tunnel'. Throughout this vibrantly colourful and joyful meander through unseen Thailand, Sue Perkins is funny, fresh and empathetic, happily losing herself in Thailand.

Network
Scheduleevery Friday at 21:00 (60 min)

Last Episode

Episode 3
Season 1Episode 360 min

Episode 3

In the final episode Sue visits the country's heady and exotic capital, Bangkok.

Her journey starts with a bang. At home, she enjoys an occasional bout at the boxing gym but that's no preparation for being thrown into the ring with a highly flexible Muay Thai champion fighter. Jade Sirisompan is as impressive in the ring as she is outside of it, explaining how she led the way for Thai women in a male-dominated sport.

In the lush Phetchaburi province Sue visits a charity refuge where she's shocked to hear of the scale of tiger exploitation in Thailand, with over 2000 tigers held in captivity, compared to less than 200 left in the wild. She prepares a meaty feast for one of the fortunate tigers who has been rescued from a zoo where her days were spent chained to a small concrete pad.

Back in Bangkok, Sue moves onto more positive matters at an electric tuktuk company addressing Bangkok's sky-high air pollution, which kills nearly 30,000 people every year – more than road accidents, drug use and murder combined. Amid a tropical storm, Sue is let loose at the wheel of one of these £9000 vehicles, and it doesn't take long for her to realise that the acceleration is very efficient!

In the seaside town of Bang Saen Sue cheerfully follows a sign that says ‘Welcome to Hell'. Hidden behind a Buddhist Temple is a ‘Hell Garden' which - with the visual aid of some very graphic statues - outlines the potential consequences of sin.

Next Sue meets an ethical coconut farmer who encourages her have a go at harvesting the aromatic coconuts with secateurs 20 feet above her head. Why ethical? Because most coconut farms use chained monkeys to harvest the crop, whereas here there is not a monkey in sight. Back in town, Sue helps prepare a little taco that packs a big punch with one of Thailand's most impressive – and youngest – Michelin-starred chefs.

Sue rounds off her journey in a suitably rambunctious style by jamming with a group of musicians who are taking traditional Molam music (northern folk, Thai style) to the next level with some truly banging disco tracks. It's the perfect way to end an utterly magical and revealing voyage through Thailand.

May 24, 2024

Recent Episodes

EpisodeNameAirdate
S01E03Episode 3May 24, 2024
S01E02Episode 2May 17, 2024
S01E01Episode 1May 10, 2024
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