Remarkable Stories

David Gluckman grew up in South Africa when the country was still in the grip of apartheid. He arrived in London at the start of the sixties and spent a great deal of time chasing women, drinking booze and smoking cigarettes.

He was an ad man and, albeit very briefly, he was a copywriter but it was as an inventor of drinks brands that he really found success. There's Baileys, of course, but David also invented Le Piat d'Or, Aqua Li...

This is the strange tale of a British family who decided to establish their own nation.

On Christmas Eve 1966, Paddy Bates and his son, Michael, took possession of an abandoned anti-aircraft gun emplacement seven and a half miles off the coast of southeast England. The following year, they declared independence. Fifty-two years later they are still independent despite the occasional hiccup such as an armed invasion by German mercen...

John met Johannes Volbehr in Jamaica a few years ago. At the time, the happy-go-lucky world traveller was making his way from Germany to South America by working his passage aboard private sailing vessels.

Shortly after their encounter, Johannes and an acquaintance called Ine were taken on as crew by the skipper of Our Joy, a sailboat bound for Panama.

The journey did not go as planned.

Johannes tells his tale to Remarkable Stories...

In Part One of "WILL THIS KILL ME," Garry Eveleigh joined Remarkable Stories' Mike McDowall as the pair traipsed about the island of Mallorca in search of edible wild food. They found plenty of delicious things to eat—but no mushrooms. And since we all know that mushrooms are pretty much fabulous, they decided to go find some up in the hills. They are joined in this episode by Mike’s friend Corinna Perry.

If you are interested in l...

Garry Eveleigh finds food everywhere—in the front yard, in the hillsides, at the side of the road. He knows which plants are delicious and which may kill you. You see, Garry is a professional forager.

He has been employed by some very high-end British restaurants to devise fresh, sustainable menus, and last year, on a sunny autumn day, Garry took Remarkable Stories' Mike McDowall on a food finding mission that began, conveniently e...

In a very different edition of Remarkable Stories, John gets together with his friend Dano to tear into some YouTube sailing channels and to recommend alternatives to the usual top five. There's not enough room to list the channels we offend, but a few that we liked included Sailing with the Litzenbergers, Acorn to Arabella, Wind Hippie Sailing, and Christian Williams. Check 'em out.

Let us know what you think of Remarkably Un...

"Posh Pete" — born Pieter Tritton — smuggled millions of dollars of cocaine out of South America, managing to stay one step ahead of law enforcement for years. But eventually his luck ran out, and he was apprehended in a hotel room in Ecuador with 8 kilos of cocaine in his possession. The result was a  12 year sentence in one of the world's deadliest prison systems.

Pieter started young and learned the nuance of the smuggling ...

Janine Georgette wanted to learn to sail. She was, in her words, "sea bit." But she lives in New York City—one of the most expensive cities in the US and certainly not an easy place for a divorced woman in her 60s to find a boat on a shoestring budget. But Janine is about as determined a woman as you might find.

As an 11 year old, Janine wanted to learn to ski. She was frustrated by how easy and natural it was for the kids...

Don McIntyre has spent his entire life engaged in daring exploits. He has sailed the toughest seas, he has led expeditions to the most inhospitable places, he has been an endurance pilot, a rally driver, and an Antarctic explorer. He has won medals and accolades in numerous countries. He has written books and produced documentaries. He has built boats and aeroplanes. More recently, he revived the Golden Globe Race - a solo circumna...