'Dyslexia is my SUPERPOWER!'

Matt Baker on his love for the countryside, health and life after The One Show

- VICKI POWER

Matt Baker may be a well-loved presenter and successful TV producer - the mastermind behind Our Farm in the Dales and Travels with Mum and Dad - but the job title he values most is that of farmer.

'It's interesting how the general public sees me sitting on The One Show and thinks, "Oh, now you live in a town," says Matt, 46. 'But I've only ever lived six months of my life without a flock of sheep, and that wasn't a happy six months. I have never left that world of farming, working and being out there. I love that tough life and I have actively gone out to find it.'

Those six months were when Matt first moved to London over two decades ago to host Blue Peter. He wasn't a fan of the urban jungle. 'I didn't get on very well at all, and I was straight out to the hills that surrounded it, getting a flock of sheep and putting them in a paddock,' says Matt of his move to the Chilterns in Buckinghamshire.

'The countryside makes me who I am. I couldn't do everything I do in my telly world without all the stuff I do in my countryside and farming world.

So I've never left it.' Matt still lives in the same part of Buckinghamshire - with his wife Nicola, and their teenagers Luke and Molly - and still farms sheep.