Lives Less Ordinary

Ron Bishop was 14 when he says police forced him to make false statements on the witness stand during a 1984 murder trial. His testimony helped sentence three innocent teenagers to life in prison.

In …

Cesar Millan is known for training dogs on TV. What’s less well-known is that he migrated illegally to the US from Mexico and slept rough before making his name.

For the past two decades, Cesar Milla…

How a romantic getaway ended in disaster.

Dutch financier Annette Herfkens boarded Vietnam Airlines Flight 474 in November 1992, embarking on what was meant to be a romantic break with her fiancé Will…

A heads-up on some of the extraordinary stories to look forward to from September - from a long-lost son, to the sole survivor of a plane crash, to Afghanistan’s answer to Bruce Lee. We're back with …

As the Avontuur draws closer to Hamburg and its final port of call, the crew begin to reflect on what they’ve been through and what awaits them in their lives back on land. But first, there’s a party…

After 188 days without setting foot on land, the Avontuur finally arrives in Horta, in the Azores. Before the crew can finally get off the ship, there are a few last hurdles to contend with. Ship’s c…

As the crew of the Avontuur fight their way out of the Gulf of Mexico and battle a hurricane that delays their journey back across the Atlantic, ship’s cook Giulia faces the spectre of food and gas s…

Denied entry to a series of ports in the Caribbean, the crew of the Avontuur begin to wonder whether they will ever be able to get off the ship. They mend sails and find creative ways to entertain th…

Unable to step off the ship, tensions are rising amongst the crew of the Avontuur and coping mechanisms begin to emerge. When the dry store is raided and boxes of biscuits go missing, ship’s cook Giu…

In the middle of the Atlantic, the crew of the Avontuur receive a satellite email with news from land that throws everything they’d been counting on to the winds. Their mission and schedule are in di…

15 people, 188 days at sea, one extraordinary ship: how the Avontuur was locked down at sea during the Covid-19 pandemic.

What would you do if your world shrunk to 300 square metres, and you had no sa…

15 people, 188 days at sea, one extraordinary ship: how the Avontuur was locked down at sea during the Covid-19 pandemic.

What would you do if your world shrunk to 300 square metres, and you had no sa…

A corporate high-flyer ended up living in a forest after a spiral of debt, shame and secrecy.

After avoiding a mounting debt to his landlord, Australian Mic Whitty’s life started to crumble. Instead o…

Robin Green is an American writer who has been dizzyingly successful, but she describes herself as a 'clueless girl'. At times, she didn't even realise she could actually write. In the early 1970s wh…

Artist Kubra Khademi was so enraged by the constant sexual harassment faced by women in Afghanistan that she created a bespoke suit of armour, forged out of metal with exaggerated breasts and buttock…

After being kidnapped, a promise to return to his mother helped Antonio Salazar-Hobson through his darkest hours.

Antonio Salazar-Hobson was four years old when he was kidnapped from his Mexican migra…

While visiting friends in Uruguay, British teacher Tom Michell saw a penguin covered in oil and tar on a beach. Tom cleaned the bird as best he could and then tried to release it. The penguin refused…

In Judith Obina Okumu's imagination, Joseph Kony was a monster. As leader of the Lord's Resistance Army he'd fought a decades-long war against the government of Yoweri Museveni – displacing and destr…

Opal Lee is now affectionately known as the Grandmother of Juneteenth. She led the campaign for the 19th June, the day in 1865 when enslaved people in Texas were finally told that they were free, to …

When Dr Pier Piccioni woke up after a car accident, 12 years of his life had been erased.

Dr Pierdante Piccioni is an unwilling time-traveller. Twelve years of his life were completely wiped from his …