In a special one-off edition of the rail-based travel programme, actor Stephen Tompkinson relives the gracious and luxurious days of colonial train journeys on the Eastern and Oriental Express. His itinerary takes in a food market in Penang, Malaysia, a Buddhist temple in Thailand and Kanchanaburi: the site of the Death Railway and the bridge over the River Kwai.

Hollywood star Danny Glover travels through Senegal into poverty-stricken Mali on a journey to discover whether such nations can achieve economic advancement without a loss of African identity. Along the way, he meets musician Youssou N'Dour and film director Sembene Ousmane.

Comedian Nick Hancock crosses Cuba, where his plans are disrupted by the country's crumbling infrastructure and the arrival of Hurricane Georges.

Chef Rick Stein crosses Mexico from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean, travelling on the spectacular rail route that winds through Copper Canyon and the Sierre Madre mountains.

The BBC's Asia correspondent Fergal Keane explores Japan, contrasting life in the busy, sprawling cities with the peace in the countryside as he learns about the nation's spiritual side.

Ex-cabinet minister Michael Portillo reveals his complicated family roots as he makes good use of Spain's extensive rail network to visit the hordes of relatives who remember his father, a poet and professor of law who joined the republican forces during the Spanish Civil War.

Editor of Private Eye and TV satirist Ian Hislop discovers India by travelling by rail from the port of Calcutta to the desert forts of Rajasthan. On the way he poses for photographs outside the Taj Mahal, visits the Indian parliament and is pampered aboard a special train called the Palace on Wheels.