Stephen Mangan
The Travel Diaries
Holly Rubenstein
4.6 • 758 Ratings
🗓️ 12 August 2025
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On today's Season 15 finale, we are joined by the brilliant Stephen Mangan - actor, presenter, writer, and someone with a truly adventurous travel spirit. You’ll know him from a vast array of TV , film and stage hits - The Split, Green Wing, Episodes, Portrait Artist of the Year - and most recently, as the host of ITV’s Caribbean-set hit game show The Fortune Hotel, which is back for its second season.
Stephen is a natural storyteller, and in this conversation we really get to go on a journey. From long, cassette-filled car trips back to his family’s roots in wild, windswept County Mayo - where he has 53 first cousins! - to body surfing in the Atlantic with his kids, sleeping under the redwoods in California, living on £4 a day while interrailing across Europe, and living in an ultra luxury hotel in Grenada for a month - Stephen has truly embraced travel in all its forms.
Destination Recap:
- County Mayo, Ireland
- Sonoma County, California, USA
- Beltane Ranch, Sonoma, USA
- Derwent Water, Lake District, UK
- Falkirk Wheel, Scotland
- Grenada
- India
- Bhutan
- Morocco
- Japan
The Fortune Hotel S2 continues Wednesday 13th and Thursday 14th August on ITV1 and ITVX. You can also catch up on the first two episodes of the series on ITVX now.
Thanks so much for listening today. If you want to be the first to find out who is joining me next time, come and follow me on Instagram I’m @hollyrubenstein, and you’ll also find me on TikTok - I’d love to hear from you. And if you can't wait until then, remember there’s the first 14 seasons to catch up on, that's over 155 episodes to keep you busy.
I'm now on maternity leave for a few months but keep an eye out for some special episodes dropping into your feed from time to time.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the Travel Diaries podcast and to the Season 15 finale. I'm your host Holly Rubinstein and here each week I'll be speaking to a very special guest about the seven chapters in their life's travel |
| 0:23.1 | diaries. |
| 0:23.8 | From their all-time favourite destination and their hidden gem to their worst travel experience |
| 0:30.4 | and what's at the top of their travel bucket list, we'll be uncovering their adventures |
| 0:35.1 | around the world and the travel experiences and destinations that have |
| 0:39.8 | shaped their lives. Before we get started, I just wanted to say a heartfelt thank you for the |
| 0:45.7 | support and love you've shown this season. And of course, a huge thank you to all of my fabulous |
| 0:50.0 | guests as well. And I wanted to let you know that I'm going to be pressing pause here on the |
| 0:54.9 | podcast for a little while. I'm about to have a baby, as you might know, literally any day now. |
| 1:01.5 | So I'll be taking a longer break than usual between seasons to focus on that for a bit. |
| 1:07.2 | And I'll be back with a few special episodes in the coming months that I've already got |
| 1:11.6 | lined up so do keep an eye out and of course I'd love you to stay in touch too over on |
| 1:16.2 | Instagram and TikTok you know where I am I'm at Holly Rubenstein you know I will miss you guys |
| 1:21.4 | over the next few months let's get started though with today's guests because what a guest he |
| 1:26.2 | is to close the season. |
| 1:28.0 | Today I'm joined by the brilliant Stephen Mangon, actor, presenter, writer and someone with a |
| 1:33.9 | truly adventurous travel spirit. You'll know him from a vast array of TV and stage hits, |
| 1:40.6 | the split, Green Wing episodes, Portrait and Lands and landscape artists of the year. And most recently, |
| 1:46.0 | as the host of ITV's hit game show, The Fortune Hotel, filmed in the beautiful Caribbean, |
| 1:52.6 | which is back for its second season. Stephen is just such a natural storyteller. And in this |
| 1:58.9 | conversation, we really get to go on a journey from long |
| 2:02.2 | cassette-filled car trips back to his family's roots and wild windswept county Mayo where he has |
... |
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