Watch: Historian Dan Snow reveals documentary plan for world heritage site and 'one of my favourite places'

Courtesy: Instagram/thehistoryguy

Transcript

00:00 (birds chirping)

00:02 This is one of the wonders of the world.

00:05 This is the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

00:08 just outside Llangollen in North Wales.

00:11 It is the longest canal aqueduct in Britain.

00:15 It is the highest canal aqueduct in the world.

00:19 It is also one of the original and the best clad in iron.

00:22 Check this out.

00:23 It was built and planned and built about 10 years,

00:25 completed in 1805.

00:27 That's what great wooden ships were fighting each other,

00:30 Battle of Trafalgar.

00:31 And this 300 meter long aqueduct,

00:35 40 meters above the valley floor

00:38 with a channel 1.6 meters deep up there

00:40 so that narrow boats could go back and forward.

00:43 It was part of an incredibly ambitious program

00:46 to link the resources, the valuable,

00:48 the commercial potential and mineral potential

00:51 of North Wales to Northwest England, to Liverpool.

00:54 This was gonna connect North Wales

00:57 to the great link between the Severn River and Liverpool.

01:01 Astonishingly ambitious infrastructure plan.

01:04 And it was completed.

01:05 And today it is a World Heritage Site.

01:08 It is one of my favorite places in the world.