Peep Show

Peep Show is back for its final ever series. Possibly not before time, I would say, as Mitchell and Webb have long outgrown it in terms of career, family, newspaper columns and their constant panel show appearances. You see too much of them elsewhere these days to still believe them to be Mark and Jeremy. Mitchell and Webb never actually shared a flat in Croydon, stole each other's duvets and girlfriends, or wasted their lives in dead-end bands or dead-end clerical jobs. But somehow you think they did, and they just don't do it any more. So if they want to be convincing QI panellists, they kind of need to leave Mark and Jeremy behind for good.

Yet they have slipped back into the roles so comfortably, like jelly out of a mould or an eel into a river. Mark and Jeremy are just the same in their bitter love-hate relationship and can't-live-together-can't-live-apart needy dependency. They still make me laugh with their never spoken aloud one-liners, whether on the subject of futons, juice or apologies. The unique camera angles remind me of when our daughter takes photographs - everything wonky and at the wrong height and someone staring at her with a slight look of horror that screams "DON'T DROP IT!".

Peep Show camera angles

Super Han(d)s, at three-year-old height

Don't drop it!

It's only natural for a woman to wonder what a man is thinking, and Mark and Jeremy tell us, proving that it's not just about the stereotypical football scores. There is anarchy, anger and angst tucked in between. There is William Morris. And Napoleon.

Jargon-loving Johnson still spouts bullshit in his new bank meets car showroom. But Super Hans has gone sober, Dobby has moved to New York and Olivia Colman is too busy solving murders to appear...(dare we hope?)... yet. Jeremy is living in Super Hans' bathroom, which is the ultimate depiction of the London property rental market, where people - if they are single and aren't proper bankers - can end up sharing poky flats at exorbitant prices into well beyond middle age. "I mean, it's not Number One Hyde Park Palace or anything", says Jez. No, it's a sleeping bag in a bath, with a kettle for a kitchen and Super Hans regularly barging in to use the loo. The only thing that gives you comfort is the knowledge that Jeremy is unlikely to be paying Super Hans any rent. But soon Jez is evicted by Sober Hans' fiancee after he takes the flak for a cocaine incident. Super Hans feels guilty enough about this to bury Mark's smug new flatmate (Jerry) in his sleeping bag, shove him in a lift and waterboard him with beer. And that's it - Mark and Jeremy are back together, whether they really want it or not. And they do want it, really.

Mark and Jeremy's flat may be in Croydon, but the opening credits of the first five series were filmed in Crouch End, where my husband and I bought our first flat. We got our microwave from that television shop. The shop was called Power House or Power Point or Power Ranger or something Power-based that I can't remember now. Whatever, the microwave power it supplied is still going strong, 12 years on. But the shop isn't - it became a fancy Italian delicatessen and cafe about halfway through our Crouch End residency.

The microwave

Spiazzo in Crouch End, once the television shop on Peep Show

Behind Mark, you can see Hornsey Town Hall, and behind Jeremy, Walter Purkis The Fishmonger.

Hornsey Town Hall

Crouch End Broadway and Clocktower, with Spiazzo on the right

When Peep Show went into HD, they re-filmed the credits, and relocated them to Croydon High Street. Which is kind of as it should be. But I miss the little pastiche of Crouch End, our London home. I think Mark and Jeremy could have been a lot more harmonious, and possibly even happy in Crouch End. Instead of bitching on the sofa, they could have gone for a brunch at Banner's, a bun from Dunn's, Thai food at O's, tapas at La Bota, or a date night at Bistro Aix. Or they could have joined the comedians Downstairs At the Kings Head, where the audience can touch the ceiling and the heckles are a paragon of politeness. Or they could have stared at the celebrities on street corners and a Time Lord, a newsreader and half the cast of EastEnders in the gym. They could have shopped in a Londis where zombies roamed in Shaun Of The Dead, or tripped on pavements littered with prams. Crouch End - that little bohemian village in North London with no Tube but an awful lot of Bugaboos.

Dunn's Bakery

King's Head, with its low-ceilinged comedy club in the basement

I am part of that London generation that grew up with Mark and Jeremy. I wouldn't call myself grown up now so much as grown old. But Mitchell and Webb have definitely grown up. And now it seems it's finally time for Mark and Jeremy to grow up too. Adios, el Dudes.

Lewis

So it's farewell to Lewis, again. It looked like ITV might kill him off in a letter bomb explosion, but at the last minute they sent him off with lovely "I cut up dead people" Laura into the New Zealand sunset instead.  It was such a sudden change of heart that Lewis only had time to pack a baby vest with a dodo on the front. But he did get another chance to wear the Hawaiian shirt he wore in the first ever episode, which was the last time he went on holiday. Hathaway served as airport cabbie then too - turns out he has kept the sign all these years.

Auckland sunset from Achilles Point

Lewis claimed he had tried travelling but hadn't liked it, which is why he ought to stay behind in Oxford watching philandering Maths researchers get blown to smithereens and archaeologists uncover corpses in wells. But then he finally realised that academics will never stop murdering each other so he ought to just leave them to it and enjoy his retirement instead.

As for New Zealand, what's not to like? Apart from the 24 hours on a plane it takes to get there. Especially with a screaming baby for the nine-hour leg from Singapore to Auckland. (Goodness, I'd be a lot more sympathetic to that now.) And the tedious customs procedures. New Zealand is the only country where my backpack was immediately pounced on by sniffer dogs. Not because I chose it for my first ever drug smuggling attempt, you understand, but because the backpack had at some point contained sandwiches and the dogs are on the hunt for food. They aren't hungry (or at least I hope they aren't), but you can't bring in any fresh produce. Or mud, for that matter. (Traveller's Tip - for an easy way to get dirty hiking boots professionally cleaned, just walk them through the Nothing To Declare Zone of Auckland airport.)

But New Zealand is also the only country where I have sat in a hot tub overlooking banana palms and an azure bay of ocean within an hour of arriving. God, after what felt like days on a plane, that was one of the best moments of my life. Thank you to the Best. Auckland. Hosts. Ever. I hope Lewis and Laura can come and stay with you.

What else awaits our favourite copper in the Land Of The Long White Cloud? Well, probably a lot of long, white cloud - and rain, and cyclones. But between the tropical storms the sun will shine, and go round the sky a different way, which may be a little disconcerting at first.

A Maori marae in a cyclone, Rotorua

Lewis will have to learn the Haka, or at least the Hokey-Cokey in Maori, so he doesn't embarrass himself at a rugby match or a hangi concert. He may also have to learn to prefer wine over beer.

Pinot Noir on the vine, Wanaka

And he may have to develop a penchant for adventure sports. In Oxford, the only people thrown off buildings were corpses, but in New Zealand it's a national pastime.

Queenstown. Something death-defying was inevitably happening behind me.

Lewis may also find the scenery a little more enchanting than never-ending sandstone quadrangles and the buses choking up the Cowley Road. It'll be more JRR Tolkien*** than CS Lewis, but with just a touch of Lewis Carroll. (Hm, I just wondered - did Colin Dexter name Lewis after Oxford authors more famous than him?)

Lord of the Rings country

Puzzling World, Wanaka

But if Lewis does end up missing those Oxford cerebral types teetering on the spectrum, he only needs to head to The Giant Jersey in Geraldine. It's a knitting shop that not only houses the aforementioned world-record holding jumper (and thankfully no Giant Gyles Brandreth to put it in), but also a reproduction of the entire Bayeux tapestry made out of three million knitting machine cogs. It took the owner 25 years to build it, and he will take almost as long to tell you about it.

Because nearly everyone is still stuck in that shop listening to the knitting machine man, New Zealand's crime rate will be lower than Oxford's, Lewis will be relieved to hear. (Or at least it will be until he gets there. We may find Oxford's drops a bit now in return.) The only explosions he is likely to witness will be geothermal. "These used to be the basketball courts", our host in Rotorua told us during a drive round the city, "Only they erupted."

Lady Knox Geyser, Waiotapu

Blow hole at Pancake Rocks

There may be earthquakes too, something which doesn't happen very often in Oxford. One of Oxford's college namesakes, Christchurch, was thankfully still intact when we were there. Lewis won't have heard of Christchurch College though, which means he may go round asking people where the city called Wolsey is. But it's OK - they probably won't understand his Geordie accent.

Christchurch Cathedral

Ah, I jest. Just get out there and enjoy it, Lewis. All those miles and miles of amazing mountains, lagoons, beaches and bush. May there be no Maoris murdered and plenty of late-night cake. (That's not a euphemism, by the way - late-night cake is a genuine thing in New Zealand. We Brits binge-drink, they eat baked goods, and that's the main reason I wanted to emigrate.)

I left my heart in Wanaka

Milford Sound, where a storm was brewing and the sandflies munching

Okaritu

I will miss Lewis. But I look forward to Hathaway, the spin-off spin-off. (Don't deny that it's going to happen. Laurence Fox will get bored of singing eventually.)

The (Laurence) Fox Glacier

***Yes, I know Tolkien lived in Oxford too. I am referring to the films.

Broadchurch

Yes, I know, we are three years behind the rest of you. Sorry. That's our Lovefilm subscription for you, and my fault for missing it on television in the first place. And by the time the Broadchurch discs finally landed on our doormat, I had accidentally found out whodunit from a careless comment by a television reviewer in the Guardian. (Spoiler alert next time, please!) So I was in two minds about whether I should bother watching it after all. But anyway, I did and here we are.

This is ITV's attempt at Scandi Noir. The music is almost copied and pasted in from its Danish forebears; it's too similar to be a coincidence. (Although they would probably prefer to use the word "influence".) We have no quick resolution but instead eight episodes to draw us in, befriend the community, and see the consequences of the tragic events unfold. We don't just get to know the police investigators and the victim's family, but also the wider world at large - the journalists, the vicar, the caravan park cleaner, the plumber's mate. We have to sit through a bunch of red herrings, as each episode focuses on a different suspect before the killer is finally revealed.

But it's not as good as The Killing or The Bridge. We are definitely on ITV rather than BBC4. Somehow detective musings don't work as well in a West Country burr as they do when full of Copenhagen phlegm. And the sun was shining all the way through the first episode, which seemed wrong. But as the story progressed, the rain set in. This was Dorset, after all.

Do all coppers have a brooding and complicated back story? Is this why everyone is so rude to them in television dramas - the police have become so ineffectual in their misery that they can no longer afford respect? Have some sympathy, Joe Public. Besides, even if you are a character on a TV show, shouldn't you be just a little bit scared of someone who has the power to chuck you in a cell if you don't play your cards right? Because being surly, dismissive or just plain unhelpful is definitely not playing your cards right, in my opinion.

And why does everyone have an instant alibi spring to mind? I can't remember what I did yesterday without checking my diary, but these potential suspects can immediately say where they were and what they were doing to the nearest second as soon as they are asked, even if we are talking about weeks before. Although in this particular case, as the body was dumped on the beach in the middle of the night and I don't have much nocturnal fun any more, I would have been 99.9% sure to have been in bed. Whether or not I'd have been asleep would have been in the hands of my five-year-old. And I bet she would be unable to confirm my alibi without growling at the police officer. (I wish she would stop doing that.)

Apparently, the writers of Broadchurch didn't tell the cast who the murderer was before they filmed the final episode. So every actor was going through the whole thing not knowing whether it was them. While this is kind of a good idea for the innocent parties, surely you have to tell the actual murderer? Otherwise how can an actor give an accurate performance if they don't know they have something to hide? As I knew from the start who it was, I watched their character closely from the get-go. And they always seemed a little too innocuous and complacent given the torment they were in at the end. It was too much of a personality transplant in the last hour of the series. But of course it always has to be the person you suspect the least, just like in the days of Agatha Christie.

Most of Broadchurch was filmed in West Bay on Dorset's Jurassic Coast, and we were there in August, despite not having seen Broadchurch at the time. It was a drizzly, grey day and we almost had the beach to ourselves. In the gloom, West Bay looked exactly like the sort of desolate community where a misfit murderer might lurk. It was rundown and sad. The sea was hidden from the car park by an enormous pile of gravel. Other than a quirky antiques-centre-slash-street-food-emporium, it was a melancholy collection of shabby hotels, chandlers and charity shops. The surprisingly snazzy Broadchurch police station was a property redevelopment on the quay that looked empty and out of keeping with the rest of the town.

It might have all looked rather more appealing in better weather. Indeed those cliffs in the sun on the first episode of Broadchurch looked absolutely stunning, despite having a dead boy at the foot of them. In the rain, they looked fit to crumble. Which of course they are.

She would not confirm my alibi

The site of the dead boy

The police station on the quay.

Jurassic Coast

Downton Abbey - The Finale

"Oh, please someone, make it stop", I said. And now someone has. The most unlikely Yorkshire drama ever to come out of Berkshire has finally come to and end. Yippee!

I decided it was only fitting that I watch the last "ever" episode of Downton Abbey. I was looking forward to the slaps, the explosions, the arrests, the hangings, the timely or untimely deaths, the fire, and whatever other emotionally decimating excitement Julian Fellowes was going to unleash on us.

Marigolds - the elephant in the room

Nice, but not to Violet's taste.

Only nothing happened really. Or at least nothing befitting a guns-blazing-off-into-the-sunset-for-all-time kind of ending. There was a bit of a flurry when Thomas attempted suicide in the bath, but it was quickly ascertained that he was still alive and he was soon sitting up in bed fingering an orange and told he didn't have to find a new job after all. Mrs Patmore's bed and breakfast briefly became a house of ill repute, but a few days later the Granthams were dropping by for afternoon tea to restore its reputation. Mary did get called a bitch, but no sign of the slap that she probably deserved alongside. The Dowager returned from the Riviera as soon as Robert announced it was jolly good that she wasn't around, but she didn't swoop in with quite the sense of autocracy you felt was required. She did give Mary a good talking to, but it was full of kindness and none of those acerbic one-liners we have grown used to. The only untimely death was off-screen in Tangiers. There was a shot-gun wedding, but the wrong daughter got the happy ending. And it seems Bates isn't a secret murderer after all.

But golly gumdrops, at least they have stopped talking about the bloody hospital.

And it turned out it wasn't the final episode ever. There's a Christmas special. Groan. So maybe Julian Fellowes is saving all the drama for then. The birth of Anna's baby. The reconciliation of Edith and Bertie. The affair of Mary and Branson, leading to Henry pranging his racing car into a wall. The elopement of the Dowager and Spratt after she becomes his agony aunt column's greatest fan. The closing down of the village school after Ofsted observe one of Molesley's lessons on the Divine Right of Kings. Daisy's matriculation at Oxford. The recurrence of Lord Grantham's burst ulcer after too many of Mrs Patmore's scones. The burning of Downton. though I realise the latter may be a bit of an inconvenience for the good folk at Highclere. Especially at Christmas.

Or will it just be more of the same, leaving Julian the option of coming back for a seventh series after all, and leaving us as depressed as a Queen Vic Christmas dinner?

It will all come good in December. Or not.

(*** Disclaimer: I may have watched more of the sixth season than I am prepared to admit.***)

Great Continental Railway Journeys - Vienna to Trieste

Sorry, Portillo's off again. Still clutching no other luggage than his battered Bradshaw's. Still wearing neon clothes. Still seeing the very best Europe has to offer.

Heldenplatz, where Hitler gave his speech
announcing the Anscluss of Germany and Austria

First stop this series - Vienna. City of coffee, waltzes and the original croissant. At the time of the 1913 edition of Bradshaw's, Franz Ferdinand was still alive, just. As was the Austro-Hungarian Empire, just. By then it was ruling a ridiculous number of countries, but cracks were definitely appearing at the seams. Rebels in Vienna's midst were clamouring to transform its medieval society model into a vibrant, modern city. Russian spies were blackmailing the military, Freud was analysing the soul. Secession architects and Klimt were doing amazing things with gold leaf. Schiele, Schnitzler and Schoenberg were revolutionising cultural life. Exciting times, but with dark threats in murky corners. Jews were dominating the middle classes, but anti-Semitic feeling was rife. Adolf Hitler, amongst them, was failing to be an art student and acquiring beliefs that - as we all know - would have catastrophic consequences.

The Secessionsgebaeude

The Ringstrasse, commissioned by Emperor Franz Josef after he ordered the razing of the slums, is looking magnificent on our screens. So very white and pristine. It's just one pompous edifice after another. Theatre, opera, museum, parliament, palace. But all conveniently connected by tram.

Rathaus

But what's this? Uh-oh, I hear a zither. Michael, please don't do the Third Man thing. Orson Welles did it so much better. Oh no, here it comes. Sipping coffee, those large lips curling upwards in a sneer. Glancing sideways through bad sunglasses, looking furtive. As if anyone in a pink shirt could ever look furtive. It's all an excuse for Portillo to go on the Big Wheel in the Prater. His car is set up to dine.

I once spent a week in Vienna, the house guest of a flautist who played in one of the city's orchestras. He lived round the corner from the Schoenbrunn Palace, whose garden at the time was bursting with spring flowers. The apartment block was full of musicians, and the sounds drifting up the stairwell as they all practised in their separate abodes was mesmering, yet as cacophonous as Schoenberg. The flautist slept on a chaise longue, bought us McDonald's to eat each evening and had his life ruled by his mother. He also got us free tickets for a box at the ballet on the Ringstrasse, where - as an interrailing student - I have never felt so underdressed in my life.

It was a busy week. A homage to Beethoven in the city cemetery. My first chance to brush against Klimt's Kiss, where his pencil drafts were still visible below that wonderful gold leaf. A wall of lace at the Museum of Applied Art. Wine at a Heurige. And a Melange coffee which kept me shaking for days.

Karlskirche

Vienna has a brand spanking new Hauptbahnhof, from where it's finally possible to go East, South, North and West from a single station and stressful U-Bahn transfers are no longer required. Look and learn, London. Portillo heads off to the Semmering Pass, dressed in purple and orange. After a spot of sledging and a visit to Graz, he carries on to Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, which I still find impossible to spell without Googling. At the time of Bradshaw's it still had a German name - Laibach.

Llubljana

Ljubljana is beautiful. It has a vast array of colourful Secession facades, since half its buildings were lost in an earthquake on Easter Sunday in 1895, giving Viennese architects ample opportunity to show off their talent. It's a city where I ate mushroom soup out of a bread bun and cauliflower on a pizza. One was good, the other not so much. Portillo spends his time sharing fruit liqueurs with the ladies. Behind him is the V-shaped bridge and the pharmacy where I had to buy ear plugs as our hotel was so noisy at night.

Secession facades

A building painted in the colours of the Slovenian flag

We spent a week in Slovenia and I would rate it as one of my favourite countries to visit, ever. Such diversity within a tiny geographical area - Alps, meadows, waterfalls, castles, karst, coast. Venetian ports, Viennese cities. Warm, clean, friendly. My grumpy husband on a grumpier horse. A boat captain who brewed brandy-strength wine, sailed us to Trieste and gave me the worst hangover of my life. That should never be repeated, but a return visit to the country - one I day, I hope.

Alps, meadows...

Waterfalls...

Castles

Karst...

Coast