Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond on the UK tourist destination that ‘saved him’

Richard Hammond wants people to think about their favourite places and about mortality. Photo / Johnny Gios, Unsplash; YouTube, Whats Next

When Richard Hammond speaks, all some hear is the sound of an obnoxious V8 engine.

Normally seen burning fossil fuels through exotic destinations and making off-colour jokes, the motoring journalist turns a lot of people off.

However the ex-Top Gear presenter has won admiration recently after speaking about a place that saved his life.

Earlier this week Hammond released a clip via his YouTube channel about what he experienced after a high-speed crash in 2006.

He was put into intensive care with a brain injury after what he called “a particularly flamboyant crash” involving a jet-powered drag racer. Hammond was in a coma for two weeks. He was given little chance of surviving.

In the three-minute video the journalist revealed the place his mind took him to as doctors saw that he was dying.

“That was my last thought. And my last thought took me somewhere that I love and that I’m happy.”

Having been to many exotic places filming TV shows the Grand Tour and Top Gear, he was surprised by where he was taken at the end of the road.

It wasn’t the Makadikadi salt flats nor the Bolivian jungle, but a rainy hill in northwest England.

Filming under a tree in England’s Buttermere, in the Lake District, he told viewers that this was a real place.

“The memory of this was of me going up the hill towards this beautiful tree,” he said.

He said that, as he approached the stump, he felt a strong sensation of being told off “like being a naughty teenager”. Then the dream took a turn and he felt himself returning back downhill. His health improved and he did not die.

It was only after he recovered from that coma that his wife, Mindy, told him that she had been shouting for him to come back.

The broadcaster and ambassador for brain charity The Children’s Trust, says he suffered a brain injury to his frontal lobe in the accident.

He was asked to revisit the place 16 years later, by the BBC’s PM programme.

“It was about how much I loved the place and about encouraging people to share places they were connected to,” he says.

Brain injuries and mortality are heavy subjects, which more people should discuss, he says. It’s a lot easier to think about the places we’d think of in difficult situations or that give us reasons to live.

“My brain took the chance to conjure up my absolute favourite place in the world, my favourite activity. Which is to go for a nice simple walk… up a hill in the Lake District.”

He told the programme that he wanted his ashes scattered at the tree.

He hoped it would encourage more conversations in families, he told PM.

“The comfort I took from that was knowing that’s what my brain will do, it will conjure up a lovely place for me to go”.

The controversial broadcaster has been best known for inflammatory remarks, prompting official complaints from LGBT campaigners and Mexico’s ambassador to London. However this video appears to have been widely appreciated by its 4.6 million viewers.

This year the New Zealand Mental Health Foundation asked travellers to think about their favourite places and memories, for their Mental Health Awareness Week campaign: “Reconnect - with the people and places that lift you up.”

Buttermere is one of three lakes in the Buttermere Valley in the north-west of the Lake District, according to Visit Cumbria. It was also one of the favourite places of author and guide Alfred Wainwright, whose memorial is in the scenic Church of St James.

The Lake District - not despite, but because of its atmospheric weather - has found popularity with international visitors.

It is known for adventure holidays as well as for the works of Beatrix Potter, whose museum is in Bowness on Windermere.

Cartmel is become a popular dining destination with Michelin-starred Cumbrian fare served at L’Enclume.

It has been an Unesco World Heritage Site since 2017, and 15 million visitors arrive every year.

It appeared on the New York Times must-see list for 2020.

Where to get help:

• Lifeline: 0800 543 354 (available 24/7)• Suicide Crisis Helpline: 0508 828 865 (0508 TAUTOKO (available 24/7)• Youth services: (06) 3555 906• Youthline: 0800 376 633• What’s Up: 0800 942 8787 (11am to11pm)• Depression helpline: 0800 111 757 (available 24/7)• Rainbow Youth: (09) 376 4155• Helpline: 1737

If it is an emergency and you feel like you or someone else is at risk, call 111.