Joanna Lumley's Silk Road Adventure

Episode 1

Venice, Albania and Turkey

Lumley starts a modern journey along (a version of) the Ancient Silk Road from its European destination, the grand dogal port of Venice, where silk and many oriental goods arrived, paid with silver and various European produce. It's also the (disputed) home of the Polo family, whose legendary Marco's (even more disputed) biographical journey kick-started many stories, legends and sometimes surviving presumptions on the East, the the Mongol empire of Kublai Khan which they visited. Next over the Balkans, focusing on surviving tracts of the Roman army road Via Egnatia in Albania, to the immensely rich metropolis Constantinople, now Istanbul, still a key pin in intercontinental trade. Finally trough some of the routes crossing Asia Minor (now Anatolia), visiting the unique cave patrimony of Cappadocia and more authentic pastoral mountain regions, where the herdsmen culture still survives all the way to Georgia.