All language subtitles for Worlds.Most.Secret.Hotels.S01E06.720p.ALL4.WEBRip.x264-GalaxyTV

Imagine staying the night
deep in the desert,

sleeping underneath the stars...

..lodging in an airship
hidden in a forest...

..or holidaying in a resort
perched on top of a glacier.

In this series,
we venture across the globe...

It's literally built into the rock,
you wouldn't even know it was here.

..to reveal some of
the world's most unique hotels,

hidden in
the most surprising of places.

Even people who are from here,

they have no idea that this is here.

From reinvented bunkers
and converted jumbo jets...

I've never experienced
something like this,

it's just a really cool place!

..to floating hideaways
and futuristic escapes.

It's like
nothing I've ever seen before!

We meet the teams
who keep them running...

We're inviting people to create
unforgettable experiences.

..and the guests
living their dreams...

This is an entrance
you don't normally see, isn't it?

Wow!

..as we explore
the world's most secret hotels.

This time, we meet the owner
of a remote retreat in Iceland...

People who are from here,

they always think
it's kind of amazing

that somebody built something here.

..we dive deep
into a sunken Swedish escape.

It's the first underwater hotel room
of its sort.

..and we explore a unique stay
that is full of surprises.

The plane's not only for show.

If we give our guests
one of these key fobs,

we show that it has a secret
all of its own.

Our adventure begins
deep in the wilderness
in British Columbia.

This is one of
the most untouched,

wild regions
of North America.

250km north of Vancouver

is a remote area
known as the Chilcotin Wilderness.

Only 1,000 residents live
in this 32 million acre landscape.

It's also home to Chilko Lake.

This 80km body of water
is fed by glaciers...

..and is the setting
of a hidden hotel...

..known as The Chilko Experience.

This complex of custom-built lodges

is the brainchild of owner
Phil Huston and his wife Annie,

who discovered this spot
whilst on holiday,

and never left.

We decided to build here

because I found
this territory 45 years ago,

and just enjoyed it
a lot.

Did a walkabout for 15, 16 months
when I was 25 years old,

picked up a hitchhiker
that told me about the Chilcotin,

and he said, you could catch a fish
every cast in the Dean River.

I bought $20 worth of groceries,
came over here...

This is a long time ago.

..and camped for ten days, fished,
and just really enjoyed it.

BIRDS OF PREY CAWING

There's a purity and a vastness here

that you just don't see
anywhere else.

We are 40 miles to the power grid,

50 miles to the post office,

200 miles to the grocery store,

but at night, you can reach up
and touch the stars.

The resort is managed
by Carly and Brad,

two travellers from the UK

who also discovered this place
by accident,

and also never left.

Phil, the owner, reached out to us

to ask if we wanted to come
and volunteer,

and we had actually been
working in the tourism industry

for a few years, and didn't really
want to be volunteering anymore.

And then Phil said
that his manager just had to leave,

so he had a spot open,

and that was it.

No-one really knows about us.

We're still
a very secret, hidden gem,

and this lake is huge,

and there's not another building
on it.

BIRDS HOOTING
AND CHIRPING

The resort can host
up to 12 visitors,

who stay in
the six, self-contained,

traditional Canadian-style
log cabins.

The largest of these
is the Tower House,

a three storey, two-bedroom building

with a distinctive tower
to one side.

This is the Tower House,

the most impressive
of all the cabins on the property.

It's a huge log home
with a three storey tower.

All six lodges in the resort
are built from red cedar.

The timber is sustainably harvested

from the west coast
of British Columbia

in order to not destroy
any of the protected forests here.

This deep redwood
is one of the strongest

and most durable timbers
you can use for building.

Each lodge was constructed off site,

using traditional handmade
techniques,

at a special workshop
over 200km away,

then deconstructed,
shipped and reassembled here.

Building the entire site
took five years.

Even though guests
have chef prepared meals

in the main house,

they also have their own kitchen
in a lot of the cabins,

and this is the Tower House kitchen.

We've got
a little hidden refrigerator here,

and a stove,
and everything you need.

The downstairs sitting room
has a feature that harks back

to the days when all Canadian houses
were built from cedar.

So this is a little different,

as it has these sections of log
holding these beams up.

This one you can see
is this branch that comes up

and holds that thing,
and it's twisted and crooked.

The design of these structures
is based on

that of traditional,
Northern European log cabins,

brought over by settlers
more than 200 years ago.

They are naturally insulated,
robust,

and have changed very little
in the intervening years.

This is the second floor up here.

This is the master bedroom.

You've got a small balcony there,

and then you overlook the views
and vistas again over there.

This is the highest floor
of the Tower House.

The floor offers this amazing view
of our little private pond,

the trees,
and then the mountain range.

Chilko Lake is just down there.

This resort is
truly in the middle of nowhere,

which makes getting supplies in
for the restaurant a real challenge.

We have to drive
three and a half hours

to the nearest grocery store,

over a very dodgy road.

We have to get the trucks fixed
every other time we go in,

because the road
just destroys the trucks!

So it's a seven hour round trip
every time that we want to get food.

It's like going
from Glasgow to Manchester

just to get some bread.

LAUGHTER

The only method of communication
here is by a satellite phone,

and the compound's off grid,
and runs off solar power.

This is our solar panel system.

There's 78 solar panels in total,

which charge our 24 two-volt
batteries in the generator room.

And that's how we get
all of our power for the summer.

We also have two back-up generators,
a large one and a small one,

two diesel ones
that are converted to propane,

so we have propane as our back-up,
so we never lose power.

The solar powers
everything on the resort,

refrigeration, all the laundry
we have to do for guests,

the lighting...
Everything.

Solar's perfectly fitting with
what we try and do as an eco-lodge,

as we're trying to get people to
see the outdoors,

and see
this amazing part of the world,

but by not really
having an impact on it at all.

Even the hot tub is eco-friendly.

The way it works is
at the bottom of the hot tub

there's a pond pump,
and that will cycle water through,

so that cycles
the cold water around this.

Around this stove
is this water jacket, it's called,

so that will fill with water,
heats that up,

and then siphons it round.

So you're just using wood,
no power at all.

Another appeal is being
so close to the wildlife

roaming freely
around the site.

The thing that we're becoming to be
very well known for

is the grizzly viewing.

So, around mid-September
we get a salmon spawn

of generally, average,
around a million salmon,

and they all spawn in this one
place,

so we get around 100 grizzlies
come down to feast.

So when we go down to the water,

there are often more grizzly
bears out there

than there are
humans coming to view them.

I think the record
that we've had was in 2019

when some of our guests went out

and saw 42 grizzlies
in the space of an hour.

The Chilcotin Wilderness is also
one of the best places to see moose,

cougars, wolves,
and foxes.

WHINNYING

Guide Taylor Archer also
takes visitors hiking,

horseback riding into the mountains,

white water rafting
on the Chilko River,

and fishing on the lake itself.

Love being out here,
it's great to get away

from the hustle and bustle
from the cities,

and off your phone,

and, you know,
really get amongst the wilderness.

Every year, I get to build
a new family that I like,

and that's fun, you know,
cos these people are from Australia,

these people from New Zealand,
these people came from Germany,

and...
Different viewpoints.

The young blood,
it's nice to have it around.

All visitors come here
to experience something different.

CARLY: I think
most people come here

to get away from
their everyday lives.

They just get here
and there's vast open spaces,

and you get a bit of fresh air,

and try out things
that you haven't done before,

and see things
that you wouldn't see at home.

There's a hidden waterfall, which we
actually had to make the trail to.

People haven't been there
in a long time.

It's not the biggest waterfall
in the world,

but to know that you're one of
only a few people to have seen it

in the last 50 years...
It's a very secret spot.

This part of British Columbia
is certainly off the beaten track.

And we have these huge plains,

this plateau that we're sitting on
right now,

that goes for several hundred miles
to the north-east and west,

and so you have four ecosystems
in a three-mile radius,

and that's why I like it here,
that's my passion,

is the diversity that we have here.

Getting to see the wildlife here

is pretty far from the everyday,
back home.

CARLY CHUCKLES

It's very remote, very wild.

And... Yeah, it's a perfect place
to have an adventure.

Still to come, we explore a hideaway
surrounded by lava fields...

They always think
it's kind of amazing

that somebody built something here.

..and a getaway
lurking deep underwater.

The people who helped me
with the build, there,

they were like...
Are you serious?

Are we gonna build
an underwater hotel room here?

We're exploring some of
the world's most secret escapes.

From hotels perched on glaciers

to airships hidden in forests.

Our next stop...

is Iceland.

A sparsely populated island,

with just 367,000 inhabitants...

..formed by extensive volcanic
eruptions over millions of years,

it is home
to more than 30 active volcanoes,

and experiences a major eruption
roughly every five years.

98km from the capital of Reykjavik,

surrounded by lava fields,

is an unusual structure.

Painted black,

and with much of the building
covered in reflective glass,

disappearing into the landscape...

is the Glass Cottage.

Even people who are from here,

they have no idea that this is here.

And they were always like, but how
did you bring the electricity there?

How did you bring the water there?

And they always think
it's kind of amazing

that somebody built
something here!

Erected in 2020,

this holiday cottage
covers 25 square metres of space,

and includes a hot tub,

a kitchen and living space,

sleeping area,

and a glass bathroom.

The landscape
that surrounds the cottage

is made up of layer upon layer
of compressed ash and volcanic sand

spewed from the nearby Mount Hekla.

Owner Ari Votat wanted to create
an escape from the modern world.

So he constructed
this timber and steel cottage

with glass walls and a glass ceiling

so that visitors could
take in the views

across the desert of black sand.

The world is getting more
and more crowded and overpopulated,

and I think
that a lot of people want to feel

like they're alone,

and in contact with nature.

You are in the middle of nowhere.

Ari designed the cottage himself,

but sourcing the materials,

and building it
on this tricky terrain

proved far from easy.

At the beginning,

we wanted to build the house
here in Iceland.

The problem was
that there's no trees.

So...

I was like, we might as well
maybe build the house

in a different country.

As Iceland is formed from lava,

it doesn't have the depth of soil
required

to support the growth
of any decent sized trees.

With no suitable wood or glass
available locally,

importing the raw materials
to build the cabin on site

would've been very expensive.

So Ari worked with
a company based in Latvia

that would prefabricate the building

using timber specially grown
for the purpose.

Triple-thick layers of toughened
glass were used

to protect the exterior from
any possible damage from wind,

and the sharp, volcanic sand.

We can have wind that goes
up to 180 km/h, which is not unusual

and of course we had to make sure
that the house will be OK,

and, you know,
survive that type of weather.

Ari's next task was
to transport

the fully-built and equipped cottage
to site.

A huge challenge
during the Icelandic winter.

The team had to lift the building
onto a truck

and drive it almost 2,000km
from Latvia to Denmark...

..where it was loaded onto a ship,
and then sailed to Iceland.

Just when they were gearing up
to drive the cottage to site...

..it began to snow.

When we woke up,
we saw, like...metres of snow.

Like I've never seen,
or rarely seen that here.

And we had, like,
almost four to five metres of snow.

It took a day and a half

for a snowplough to clear the road.

After a five-hour drive
across the frozen plain,

a crane finally lifted the cottage

onto a pre-built
concrete foundation pad.

Basically, when you come
in the cottage,

you have a view of...

well, the black sand,

and also the water, the river.

We have
a fully-equipped kitchen here,

which is an oven,
a fridge, a coffee machine...

And the hot tub, it's heated up
all year round,

at 39 to 41 degrees,

depending on the weather outside.

And it can be used all year round.

The bedroom,

you can see the Northern Lights
from the glass ceiling.

The cottage is placed
towards the north,

so when you are sleeping,
you can see the Northern Lights,

when they are showing up,
right above you,

and also in the bathroom.

The shower is all glass,

so you can see from above
and on the sides,

and you have
a direct view of the Mount Hekla,

which is
our most active volcano here.

Ari's desire for everything to be
as sustainable as possible

extends to the interior
of the cabin.

Iceland is very eco-friendly,

and it was very important for us
to make it sustainable.

Couldn't use Icelandic wood,
because there wasn't any,

so we basically... Everything else,
almost, is from the neighbourhood,

like, from around here,

except for the wood for the tables,

and it's driftwood
that comes from Russia.

And also the fittings
for the branches.

And the branches, we found
on the land over there,

so it was just wood
that we found over there,

and we used it for the lights.

The cottage's electricity
is channelled via underground cables

from a nearby farm.

Volcanic springs
criss-cross the landscape here,

so all of the building's water
is pumped from a specially dug well

that stretches 24m deep
into the lava field.

Wastewater is stored in a tank,

which is periodically collected
and removed from site.

In winter, an Icelandic day
only lasts about four or five hours,

so to fill the long evenings,

a relaxing pastime
has taken off here.

Knitting.

Local family friend Elin
has created

many of the cottage's
handknitted soft furnishings.

I do a lot of knitting, all kinds.

Jumpers,
quite a lot of them.

Socks and gloves,
hats...

Whatever comes to my mind.

I always have
something on my needles.

Elin even knitted the headboard.

When I was asked to knit this,

I thought it was an easy job to do,

but a very nice idea.

This...pattern is a very old,
Icelandic, sweaters pattern.

Those, here, to hold the key,

it's a very small jumper,
or sweater,

and it makes a nice sort of keeper
for the key.

Each guest is given one,

so he can enter the house.

It's a very nice idea.

There's plenty to see
in this lunar landscape.

From hot springs
and active volcanoes

to Haifoss waterfall.

Iceland is a beautiful place,
with many waterfalls,

and really was a great place for us

to visit a few of the local gems

in this region of Iceland.

Seeing the waterfall
was very beautiful.

One of the definite highlights
of coming to Iceland.

It was a bit of a trek, but I guess
that's not uncommon in Iceland,

so it was well worth the walk
to get there.

With almost no light pollution,

the sky at night here
is an incredible sight.

And if you're lucky, you may even
catch the Northern lights.

It was around like 10 PM or so,
before...

It got super cloudy, overcast,
and you couldn't see anything,

and then there was greenish blue
over, like, the horizon,

and we're like, they're coming!
They're coming!

I got so excited!

They, like, lit up the whole sky.

It was really majestic.

Coming up, we dive deep into
the ultimate underwater retreat.

I had a good shipbuilder
work with me,

we all get our heads together,
and we built it.

We're exploring some of
the world's most unusual getaways.

From hobbit huts...

..to mediaeval forts.

Our next stop is Sweden.

Lake Malaren, in Svealand.

This vast expanse of water
is the third largest freshwater lake

in the country,
covering an area of 1,140 square km.

With a wooded shoreline,
and more than 1,200 islands,

it's a great place
to wind down in the wilderness.

Emerging from the lake itself
is an unusual structure.

From a distance,
it resembles a floating buoy.

On closer inspection, it looks
a little like a fishing hut,

but it is, in fact, a room
of a one-of-a-kind submerged hotel,

floating two km from the shoreline,

and only accessible by boat.

This is the Utter Inn.

I always say that my...

my target group is
the eight-year-olds,

our inner child, you know,
the...

the inner part of us
that loves wonders.

It's the creation
of artist Mikael Genberg.

As an artist,
I wanted to discover more

about, you know,

kind of alternative places to dwell.

What I really wanted
was to capture people

in some kind of new scenario,

change the perspective for them.

It all started
with a treehouse hotel,

and I called it Hotel Woodpecker,

and it was a tremendous success,
from a hotel point of view,

and people wanted to stay
from all over the place.

Following the success
of the treehouse hotel,

Mikael created the Utter Inn.

He built it in the year 2000.

On top sits a small structure

that he designed in the style of
a typical Swedish wooden house,

painted red, with white trims
around the roof and windows.

The colour of the paint
is called Falu red,

originally made with
the bright coloured waste materials

from the Falun copper mine
138km away.

Inside is one room that doubles up
as a kitchen and washroom.

The master bedroom is downstairs.

A viewing deck surrounds
the top floor.

So this is...

You have a small toilet in here,

we have a small kitchen in here,

and then you have one more thing,

and that's the hatch
in the middle of the room.

Hidden down this hatch is the
biggest secret of this tiny hotel.

11 rungs down a three-metre ladder,

under the surface of the lake,

is a submerged bedroom
2.4m wide and long.

The room has two single beds,

and the walls
have four large windows

designed to give the experience
of living in an underwater world.

The lamps that light it

are all solar-powered
from panels on the roof.

Constructing this unusual space

was a huge technical challenge
for Mikael.

I mean, how do you build
an underwater hotel room?

What were kind of windows is it?

You know,
how thick should the windows be?

How much is the pressure?

You know, it's a lot of things
to think about,

and I didn't have any money,

and I couldn't find any examples,

because there weren't any.

There weren't existing
any underwater hotels in the world,

except one in Miami,
where you had to dive down 20m.

Mikael worked with a specialist team

from the local city of Vasteras

to turn his dream hotel
into a reality.

The people
who were helping me to build it,

they were like, are you serious?

Are we going to build
an underwater hotel?

And I... I didn't know anything!

I asked every company if
they could give me some kind of...

Can I get some steel plates?

"Really? OK, you can get some
steel plates, no problem.

"What size, what thickness?
This is amazing."

I had a good shipbuilder
working with me.

We all, you know,
get our heads together,

and we built it.

It's the first underwater hotel room
of its sort.

After a year-long build,

a boat transported the structure
to its mooring site,

where a crane lifted it into
position.

So, how does
this extraordinary hotel float?

The whole structure weighs
around 25 tonnes.

The walls of the bedroom
are made of 7cm thick steel,

and the windows below deck
are made of 5.5cm, hardened glass.

Although heavy,
the hotel is hollow

and lighter
than the water it is displacing,

allowing it to float,

while the extra width
of the outer deck

helps stabilise the hotel
against the waves.

And to stop it floating away,

it's anchored by chains
to two, 300kg concrete slabs

that lie 5.5m down on the seabed...

..although there's enough slack

to let the hotel
move gently in the water.

Mikael shuttles
the visitors to the Inn by boat,

and after that,
they're on their own.

Complete isolation.

You go there, you stay there, we
fetch you when you want to go back.

They must bring
their own food for their stay,

but Mikael provides fresh water
in a 10-litre tank.

I mean, you can be on it
and you can eat

and you can, you know,
have your coffee in the morning,

and sunshine,
you can take a swim...

Visitors can only stay here
between April and September,

when the weather is calm,
and the lake doesn't freeze.

But towards the autumn,

the temperature underwater can drop
to 12 degrees at night,

so the Inn has
a gas-powered heating system

that radiates below the floorboards.

Apparently, people love it.

And I think it's the thing that
you are actually submerged in water,

and you don't really...

You don't understand the emotion
before you've done it.

And then... more than one,
I don't know how many,

but more than one has actually said,

it was like coming back
into the womb!

HE LAUGHS

You know, and there's me going like,
oh, that's good, you know?

That's good!

I realised very early
that the fish loved it,

cos, you know, they come, sometimes,
hundreds towards the windows,

and they go like...

And they stare, and, you know,

it's actually kind of
a reversed aquarium.

Something for the nature,
I'm showing the wildlife of humans.

HE CHUCKLES

But it's not always easy
for visitors and fish

to see one another.

I should say
the worst place in the world to put

an underwater hotel room.

The divers, when I said
I want to build it here,

they said, Michael,
are you really going to put it here?

It's like diving in pea soup,
they said.

Lake Malaren
is rich in phosphorus and nitrogen.

This helps cultivate algae,

both free-floating and growing on
solid objects in the water,

so keeping the windows clean
is a constant battle.

This is maybe the most
important equipment we have.

There's one tricky part, and that is
to clean the windows downstairs.

I suppose we clean them
at least once a week.

Good weather, really good weather,
and I'm in good shape,

I can dive down,
and, you know, scrub the windows.

Today, it's a little bit cold.

It's very important that it has
the right angle,

and you find...
I know that the window's here.

And I go down,

and I go down,
and I go down...

and then I have to feel it.

Where the windows actually are.

It's a bit tricky,

yeah, it's a little bit
of a workout, you could say so.

Maintaining and running
a place this remote isn't easy.

It's been in the waters now
for 21 years,

and it's still working as a charm.

What I love so much about it

is that we actually succeeded
in making it,

because people said, you know,
this is impossible,

you can't do this,
why should you do it?

You know, it's...

And we struggled.

So when I see that we did it,

you know, the feeling where you see
something and say, oh, I did it!

You know?
That's what I love most about it.

Still to come,

a remarkable re-imagination
of a historic Royal Air Force base.

Nobody really knows
anything about it, to be honest.

There's no public access,
which helps keep the secret.

We're exploring
the world's most secret escapes.

From mountaintop retreats...

..to giant conkers that look like
they've landed from outer space.

Next, we're heading
to Lincolnshire,

on England's east coast.

The seaside town of Skegness

has been a Mecca for holidaymakers
for more than a century.

The heady mix of neon lights
and rollercoasters

keeps its seafront hotels
busy all year round.

But far from the coastal road,
on the outskirts of town,

is a hotel very few people
are ever likely to stumble across,

or even recognise as a hotel.

Nobody really knows anything
about it, to be honest.

They see a helicopter
and an aeroplane parked outside,

and they assume
there's a runway somewhere.

There's no public access,
which helps keep the secret.

An unusual complex sits among

fields rumoured to harbour
unexploded bombs.

Tall, barbed wire fences,

and dark, brutalist architecture
greets visitors.

It seems like
a place designed to keep people out,

but it's actually
a holiday hideaway.

It's simply called The Tower.

For those with an interest
in military history,

or even just
a taste for the unusual,

it's a perfect top-secret retreat.

For over 80 years,

The Tower was the heart of a
Royal Air Force bomb testing range.

Owner Will Roughton
grew up in the tower's shadow,

as it was slap bang in the middle
of his family's farm.

When RAF Wainfleet
closed down in 2009,

the site was due for demolition,

and Will saw an opportunity.

They couldn't sell it
to anybody else,

because it's in
the middle of our farm.

So...that's why
we got the phone call.

It's not your average transaction!

The hotel
still uses the original buildings

made of 18 inch-thick,
bombproof concrete.

Outside, bunkers originally used
as a shower block

for bomb disposal experts,

and offices for on-site security

have been converted into
three, self catering apartments.

There's also a communal games room

where guests can play pool or darts.

In the site's observation tower,
on the ground floor,

is a toilet and a kitchen.

Above that, three bedrooms sit
on top of each other.

And on the top floor
is a communal lounge.

This is the main attraction.

This is what was known
as the observation lounge.

My personal opinion
is the best thing's the view.

I mean, we're way up here, it's flat
for as far as the eye can see,

you get the great weather,
storms, sunrises, sunsets...

I think
that's the most attractive quality.

The 360-degree panorama
that once gave unrestricted views

of fighter planes
practising bombing raids

today offers spectacular vistas
across pristine salt marshes,

a Site of
Special Scientific Interest

teeming with birds
and rare wildlife.

Back in the day, this would've been
desks all the way round,

with radars, men sat at each desk
with their headphones on

coordinating the aircraft,
marking the bombing.

It's 360 glass walls,
because obviously they need to see

which direction the planes are
coming from, where they're going,

and whether
they've hit the targets or not,

and that's left us
with these great views.

There would have been
so much noise and action going on.

BOMBS EXPLODING
MACHINE GUNS RATTLING

And now, obviously,
it's a lovely, peaceful lounge

where you come and sit and enjoy
the peace and quiet, and relax.

Underneath the observation deck,

the tower conceals further secrets.

Three bedrooms
lie inside the tower itself.

One bedroom was once
the top-secret office

where airmen recorded the results of
the bombing raids conducted outside.

It looks very different today.

Away from the tower,

the outhouses also harbour
a secret or two.

Maintaining
the gritty military look outside,

but creating the accommodation
inside

was no easy task.

To keep the original appearance
of the complex,

we've also had to
build secret gardens

in positions behind the buildings

so that we haven't actually affected
the aesthetics of the compound.

It still looks as it did
as a military base,

but behind each building, there is
a fenced in, private garden,

with their own hot tub,
decking area,

for the luxury holiday
that they're coming on.

Thick concrete
and functional architecture

might not be to everyone's taste,

but Will was determined
to make sure it remained central

to his hotel's appeal.

We get a lot of people
who enjoy history,

so we get a lot of world war
enthusiasts that come down.

BEEPING

Wow, this is an entrance
you don't normally see, isn't it?

Wow!

The idea
that we were trying to create

was an experience for our guests.

The illusion that you're still
turning up to a military base,

so they get to come here, now,

and see the aeroplane and
the helicopter, the tower itself,

the complex... We've left
all the exteriors of the buildings

exactly like they were,
with their engineering bricks,

and, you know,
it's a very rugged look.

But that helps add to the surprise,

when you open the door
and you've got Egyptian cotton,

and nice lamps, and sofas,
and soft furnishings.

It's just the big contrast
that we were aiming for.

It's an extremely bold design

that means this hotel is
full of quirky charm and surprises.

It's just so imposing
in the landscape.

Everything's flat,

and then you suddenly see
this building rising up.

It's amazing.

The strangeness,
and secretness of it, yes,

and the history!

Wow.

You don't expect this, do you?

Out of a building like this.

I thought it would be
all military, hard furniture...

It's just amazing.

Transforming this robust structure
into comfortable living quarters

was a formidable
construction challenge.

The biggest challenge we had

was just the way
that the buildings are constructed.

They are supposed to be bombproof,
in case of any accidents!

We're going through 18-inch concrete
floors and ceilings to get here.

Former kitchen fitter Josh French

was tasked with
this one-of-a-kind conversion.

It's just solid,
four-inch brick, five-inch concrete,

and four-inch brick again,

so it took me like a whole day to
drill a hole for the extractor fan.

I've burnt out I can't even imagine
how many drill bits...

20, 30, 40 drill bits?
That's what the brick's like.

And it's taken a lot longer
than it should have done,

but the plus side to that is
it shouldn't ever fall down!

It does mean the rooms
have perfect soundproofing.

But it's
the non-concrete architecture

which conceals the biggest
surprises.

The plane's not only for show.

If we give our guests
one of these key fobs,

we show that it has
a secret all of its own.

SERVOS WHINE

To continue the theme,
the owners also purchased

an ex-military Jetstream
passenger plane

to house holidaymakers.

We've totally transformed this space

by gutting it,
taking out all of the seating,

and putting a double bed in the back

and a king bed in the front,

so now sleeps four people.

Isn't for the faint of heart,
though.

You know, on a very windy night,
it can rock a little bit.

The really exciting thing,
though, about the plane,

is what we've done with the cockpit.

You can basically sleep
with your head in a plane's cockpit,

and if you have kids...

What a wonderful way just to be able
to play with all the controls!

Other than the cockpit,
there are three TVs in there,

so there can't be kids falling out
over who's watching what.

We've also put some bench seats
and a little pull-out table,

so you can even eat your meals
in the aeroplane.

Diana and Will also sourced
a decommissioned Lynx helicopter

that had seen action in Afghanistan,

and transformed it
into additional accommodation.

We've converted the biggest section
of the helicopter,

and we've put underfloor heating in,
and a nice bed.

Where our guests lay their heads
on the pillow at night,

that would be
where the guns would've been set up.

A few months after we converted her,

her flight engineer from Afghanistan
actually came to visit her.

It was just really amazing
to sort of hear her back story,

and to understand
what role she played in the past.

The helicopter came with the full
cockpit still intact,

which we've left.
We've even installed some sound,

which is
the sound of the rotor blades,

and some sound
of some machine-gun fire.

GUNS THUNDER

Reconfiguring the helicopter
was yet another challenge for Josh.

Nothing's square, so I've had to
build timber frames and stuff

to put all of the new walls
and the new floors,

and to put all the fixtures on,
so, yeah, it's just the shape,

and the fact that it's not meant
to be slept in, really,

or be accommodation.

But...we've worked with it,
and we got there in the end.

It all adds up to a unique space

that blends
brutal military architecture

with surprise after surprise.

And Will is still adding
to the unusual offerings.

This is the latest
addition to the fleet.

It's our Unimog army ambulance,

which we've purchased to convert

and sleep four people
as a mobile glamping pod.

It's a stunning top-secret bolthole,

especially if you like history,
or aviation.

Tests for Barnes Wallis's
famous World War II bouncing bomb

were conducted on the marshes here.

There's certainly a lot to take in.

We just wanted
somewhere a little bit different,

a little bit special,

to celebrate our anniversary
of being together for a year.

It was...

just so magical when you drove in,

and telling people
that you could stay in a helicopter,

every person was...

"Oh, my God, really?!"

When it was open as a military base,

obviously,
it's a fairly aggressive, noisy,

you know, dangerous place, really,

and now it's turned
into this lovely, peaceful retreat.

It gives us
an enormous sense of pride.

We've achieved something that
I didn't think we'd ever achieve,

but we've persevered and persevered,

and eventually got
to where we wanted to be.

The building itself is so unusual

we just didn't want to see it
being demolished,

and had we have not bought it,
that is what would have happened.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media