Pole to Pole with Michael Palin is an eight-part television documentary travel series made for the BBC, and first broadcast on BBC1 in 1992. The presenter is Michael Palin, this being the second of Palin's major journeys for the BBC. The first was Around the World in 80 Days with Michael Palin, a 7-part series first broadcast on BBC One in 1989, and the third was Full Circle with Michael Palin, a 10-part series first broadcast on BBC One in 1997. The trip from the North Pole to the South Pole went via Scandinavia, the Soviet Union, parts of Europe, and through the heart of Africa. The intention was to follow the 30-degree east line of longitude, which would cover the most land. A last-minute diversion to Chile included South America in the series. Using aircraft as little as possible, the whole trip lasted 5½ months. The programme has been sold to many television stations around the world. It was also released on video tape and later on DVD. Following the trip, Palin wrote Pole to Pole describing the trip. The book contains many pictures from the trip, almost all taken by Basil Pao, the stills photographer on the team. Episode list The journey Cold Start Palin begins at the North Pole, flying there on a small aeroplane fitted with skis. The North Pole scene was filmed in May 1992, after the rest of the series had been shot, as weather conditions were more suitable then as the ice was too fragile the previous year. From there, he heads to Greenland, then the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, where the towns of Ny-Ålesund and Longyearbyen are located. From there he sails across the Barents Sea on a supply ship to the Norwegian port city of Tromsø, where he visits a statue of Roald Amundsen, the first man to reach the South Pole. He also meets some avid Norwegian football fans. In the town of Karasjok, he meets up with the Sami people and pans for gold in the Karasjoka River. From there, Palin travels by bus and crosses the border from Norway to Finland, where he visits Santa Claus at the Santa Claus Village on the Arctic Circle near Rovaniemi. He takes an overnight Finnish train to Helsinki; he relaxes in a sauna near Helsinki with Neil Hardwick and Lasse Lehtinen. Then Palin catches a ferry to Tallinn, his first stop