Judith Chalmers, beloved TV travel presenter, dies aged 90

Judith Chalmers, one of British television’s most familiar travel voices, died peacefully at home on Thursday aged 90 after years living with Alzheimer’s disease and a recent spell of serious illness. Her family said she had lived "an extraordinary life" across more than 60 years in broadcasting, and her son Mark Durden-Smith said she would be missed deeply, leaving behind "a giant suitcase of the happiest of memories."

Tributes began to gather quickly after news of her death, with admirers online calling her a "national treasure." That reaction reflected a broadcaster whose reach went well beyond one programme. Chalmers began at the BBC at 13, when she was selected for BBC Northern Children’s Hour in 1948, and went on to become a regular presence on Woman’s Hour, Family Favourites, Good Afternoon, Come Dancing and the Miss World contest, as well as the children’s strand that later became Blue Peter.

Her defining role came with Wish You Were Here...? The travel series first aired on ITV on 7 January 1974 and ran until 29 June 2003, making Chalmers the face of holiday television for nearly three decades. In an era before online booking and instant destination videos, the programme helped shape how millions of viewers imagined travel, combining practical information with a sense of escape and possibility. That was the source of her durability: Chalmers did not just present places, she made leisure itself feel accessible.

The travel trade voted her communicator of the year seven times, and she received an OBE in 1994 for services to broadcasting. Those honours underscored how closely her name was tied to the growth of mainstream travel media and daytime entertainment, where personality mattered as much as the destination. She later remained a recognisable figure on shows including Good Morning Britain, The Graham Norton Show and Celebrity Taste of Italy, long after her signature holiday programme had ended.

Born Judith Rosemary Locke Chalmers on 10 October 1935 in Gatley, Cheshire, she married sports presenter Neil Durden-Smith and lived in London. Their son Mark Durden-Smith later hosted the 2008 revival Wish You Were Here...? Now & Then, revisiting locations from the original series and showing how much had changed. Chalmers’s death closes the life of a broadcaster who helped define an entire age of British aspiration, when a television presenter could make the world feel both larger and closer at once.