Since 2004 he has written and presented four television series for BBC Two: Coast, Great British Journeys, Map Man and Town.

His 2000 book Two Degrees West described his walk across Great Britain from north to south, in which he followed the eponymous meridian as closely as possible.

Together with Richard Crane, he was awarded the 1992 Mungo Park Medal[4] by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society for his journeys in Tibet, China, Afghanistan and Africa.

He has served as a visiting professor at Anglia Ruskin University which presented the former student in 2012 with the award of Honorary Doctor of Science.

[7] In 2016 he published The Making Of The British Landscape: From the Ice Age to the Present, a 12,000-year historical geography of Britain.