The Blue Peter Summer Expedition was a yearly tradition in which the presenters of the BBC children's TV programme Blue Peter go to a foreign country and experience the culture and film special reports from that country, which are broadcast over several weeks in September and October. The first expedition was held in 1965 in Norway, and they continued to go somewhere every year until 2012.Marson, p.58
The Summer Expedition was traditionally announced on the last programme of the series which is usually towards the end of June. From 1971, the highlights of the expedition were shown as special programmes the following summer under the title Blue Peter Flies The World.
In 2012, with the series being broadcast all year round, the summer expedition was changed. It has been renamed the "Blue Peter Road Trip" and had purpose for going to a country(s). For the 2012 road trip, the presenters visited Poland and Ukraine because of the Euro 2012 games. The road trip was filmed over the course of one or two weeks. These would then be made as films for the live show and special programmes as usual. The expedition was abandoned after 2012.
To date, the Blue Peter team has visited the following countries:
1965 – Norway 1966 – Singapore and Borneo (without John Noakes) 1967 – Jamaica and New York City 1968 – Morocco 1969 – Ceylon 1970 – Mexico 1971 – Iceland, Norway and Denmark without Valerie Singleton 1972 – Fiji, Tonga and San Francisco 1973 – Ivory Coast 1974 – Thailand 1975 – Turkey 1976 – Brunei 1977 – Brazil 1978 – United States 1979 – Egypt 1980 – Malaysia 1981 – Japan 1982 – Canada 1983 – Sri Lanka 1984 – Kenya 1985 – Australia 1986 – no trip, due to budget cuts 1987 – Soviet Union 1988 – West Coast of the United States (without Mark Curry) 1989 – Zimbabwe (without Caron Keating) 1990 – The Caribbean 1991 – Japan (without Yvette Fielding) 1992 – Hungary with Anthea Turner, and New Zealand with Yvette Fielding 1993 – Argentina (without John Leslie) 1994 – New England, United States 1995 – South Africa 1996 – Hong Kong and China 1997 – Canada 1998 – Mexico 1999 – Australia 2000 – Spain 2001 – Vietnam 2002 – Morocco 2003 – Brazil 2004 – India 2005 – Japan (without Liz Barker) 2006 – Southern United States 2007 – Bolivia 2008 – Alaska (with new presenters) 2009 – Turkey 2010 – Italy 2011 – no Summer Expedition, due to move to Salford 2012 – Poland and Ukraine
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