Actress Rachael Stirling dreams of going to South America but dreads returning to India.
Favourite holiday destination?
South America. I've never been there and I really want to go. I think I'd have to go for a year backpacking. I've done the backpacking thing round Africa, and climbed Kilimanjaro and been to the Himalayas on my own for a few months. You can do what you want when you want that way. And it lets you see landscapes you'd never otherwise get a chance to.
What can't you go on holiday without?
Silk Cut ultra lights. I'm afraid I'm a smoker.
Favourite childhood holidays?
It would have to be Inverness and Morar. I used to spend all my summers there, visiting my great aunt. I loved it. It's somewhere you can roam wild and I loved that feeling of freedom as a child.
Holidays from hell?
It wasn't a holiday from hell, but some folk might have thought it was. In India I went on what turned out to be a death-defying bus journey from Delhi to Ledakh which takes you through the Himalayas. I was up the back of this bus surrounded by animals. I looked out the window and there were carcasses of buses all over the place, which was worrying. And if you needed to go to the loo you had to shove your bum out the window.
Next holiday?
I haven't been on a bloody holiday for years. I've been so busy working on the recent Poirot series and a film with Lee Evans called Freeze Frame. Even talking about holidays makes me realise how much I need one.
