Nick Bailey writes:

I’ve had a passion for travel since an early age which was probably fostered by the au pair girls my parents employed when I was a child (I fell in love with all of them!). Through them, I had a couple of wonderful extended holidays in France and later in Holland; and then when I was eleven the family uprooted to Australia when my father, the late actor, Robin Bailey, was offered the part of Professor Higgins in the Australian production of My Fair Lady. 

The family returned to the UK when I was fifteen but following my stint as a newsreader on both Radio Carolines in the twelve months before the stations were outlawed by the Marine Broadcasting Offences Act, I emigrated at the age of twenty to Australia as a ‘ten pound pom’. 

It was there that I had my first presenting job in the outback, at a place called Moree, four hundred miles north west of Sydney. I subsequently moved to Townsville in North Queensland and before leaving Australia, I finished up presenting a late night show in Brisbane. 

I left because I had itchy feet and wanted to explore the world, so I took off on a sort of late gap year. Hong Kong was one of my stops, where I managed to secure a few months work at Radio Hong Kong, before continuing my journey and my first taste of India. I recall being scammed on my first day in Delhi with the now infamous ‘you’ve got paint on your shoe’ trick, so I decided to buy an Indian pyjama outfit which I wore from then on, and wasn’t hassled again.

India is the kind of country that you fall in love with one day and then hate the next but it certainly gets into your blood. I’ve just come back from my third visit, and my first time to the South, having travelled with my son and eldest daughter. As my daughter lives in France, where she teaches at an international school, we were particularly interested in the former French colony of Pondicherry (now Puducherry). Although it was returned to India in 1962 it still has a gallic air with balconied yellow painted houses along tree lined boulevards, and bakeries selling baguettes and croissants. There’s also a lycée and French library.

My previous trip had been to Calcutta and Darjeeling, the former capital and summer retreat which was more akin to A Passage to India. On that occasion I managed to secure a ticket to Eden Gardens, the 70,000 seater cricket stadium, where I saw the Kolkata Knight Riders battle it out in the Indian Premier League. 

You see, cricket is my other passion. I’m a member of both Lord’s and Trent Bridge. And there was a magic moment on my recent trip to India when going for a walk in the hill country I joined some lads for a match. Actually it was just an over. And I think I held my own. Just.

Nick

Nick Bailey - Sunday morning at 9.00 on Boom Light

Nick's autobiography 'Across the Waves'  is available here