ONE LAST BIG ADVENTURE

Jumping off a moving boat, clambering over rocks is this any way for a 96-year-old with artificial knees and a pacemaker to behave? David Attenborough explains why he came out of semi-retirement to do what will probably be his final series shot on location

- JOE SHUTE

MAYFLIES have one of the most fleeting adult lifespans of any creature. The taxonomic order for the aquatic insects is Ephemeroptera, which derives from the ancient Greek ephemeros, meaning to live for one day. From hatching to mating to dying of exhaustion takes a matter of hours.

Contrast that briefest of life cycles with that of the 96-year-old man in front of me, floating on the fibreglass punt in the middle of the River Avon in Wiltshire, watching the mayflies rising from the water like flurries of inverted snow.

Sir David Attenborough is dressed in a blue linen shirt and grey slacks with his script stuffed in the pocket. It is a beautiful, cloudless day and the chalk stream swirls with fronds of emerald-green water crowfoot stalked by brown trout. 

Despite the perfect calm, out on the water, Attenborough’s famously unruly hair has swept up into an impressive silver bouffant. 

“Quick comb of the hair please, David”, comes the shout from the film crew standing on the riverbank accompanied by his daughter, Susan, who keeps a watchful eye on him bobbing about on the water. 

This year marks the 69th anniversary of David’s first appearance on our screens. He started at the BBC in 1952 and appeared as a presenter in 1954 on the series Zoo Quest.  

In 1979, he launched an entirely new genre, writing and presenting the landmark 13-episode Life on Earth. The roll call of wildlife series since are names ingrained in our cultural lives – Trials of Life, Blue Planet and Planet Earth. 

But after delivering his address to world leaders at the Cop26 climate conference in Glasgow in November 2021, David confessed to friends that he was planning on retiring from public life.