The Blue Peter Summer Expedition is a yearly tradition in which the presenters of the BBC children's TV programme Blue Peter go to a foreign country and experience the culture and film special reports from that country, which are broadcast over several weeks in September and October. The first expedition was in 1965 and they have gone somewhere every year after that, apart from 1986 and 2011.
The Summer Expedition is traditionally announced on the last programme of the series which is usually towards the end of June. The highlights of the expedition are often shown as a special programme the following summer.
In 2012, with the shows all year round run, the summer expedition was changed. It has been renamed to the 'Blue Peter Road trip' and has purpose for going to a country(s). For the 2012 road trip, the presenters visited Poland and Ukraine because of the Euro 2012 games. The road trip was filmed over the course of one or two weeks. These would then be made as films for the live show and special programmes as usual.
To date, the Blue Peter team has visited the following countries:
- 1965 - Norway
- 1966 - Singapore and Borneo
- 1967 - Jamaica and New York
- 1968 - Morocco
- 1969 - Ceylon
- 1970 - Mexico
- 1971 - Iceland, Norway and Denmark
- 1972 - Fiji, Tonga and San Francisco
- 1973 - Ivory Coast
- 1974 - Thailand
- 1975 - Turkey
- 1976 - Brunei
- 1977 - Brazil
- 1978 - USA
- 1979 - Egypt
- 1980 - Malaysia
- 1981 - Japan
- 1982 - Canada
- 1983 - Sri Lanka
- 1984 - Kenya
- 1985 - Australia
- 1986 - No Trip - the presentation team was undergoing a number of changes that summer.
- 1987 - Soviet Union
- 1988 - West Coast of the United States (Only Caron Keating and Yvette Fielding)
- 1989 - Zimbabwe
- 1990 - The Caribbean
- 1991 - Japan (Only John Leslie and Diane-Louise Jordan)
- 1992 - Hungary with Anthea Turner and New Zealand with Yvette Fielding
- 1993 - Argentina (only Diane-Louise Jordan and Anthea Turner)
- 1994 - New England, USA
- 1995 - South Africa
- 1996 - Hong Kong and China
- 1997 - Canada
- 1998 - Mexico
- 1999 - Australia
- 2000 - Spain
- 2001 - Vietnam
- 2002 - Morocco
- 2003 - Brazil
- 2004 - India
- 2005 - Japan (without Liz Barker)
- 2006 - Southern United States
- 2007 - Bolivia
- 2008 - Alaska (with new presenters)
- 2009 - Turkey
- 2010 - Italy
- 2011 - No Summer Expedition due to Salford Move
- 2012 - Poland & Ukraine
Famous quotes containing the words blue, peter, summer and/or expedition:
“Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean,—roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin,—his control
Stops with the shore;”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“Ellie: By the way, what’s your name?
Peter: What’s that?
Ellie: Who are you?
Peter: Who, me? I’m the whippoorwill that cries in the night. I’m the soft morning breeze that caresses your lovely face.
Ellie: You’ve got a name, haven’t you?
Peter: Yeah, I got a name. Peter Warne.
Ellie: Peter Warne? I don’t like it.”
—Robert Riskin (1897–1955)
“Autumn has caught us in our summer wear....”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)
“Writing a novel is not merely going on a shopping expedition across the border to an unreal land: it is hours and years spent in the factories, the streets, the cathedrals of the imagination.”
—Janet Frame (b. 1924)