However, they took too long to navigate the Raz passage, and were spotted at dawn on 17 September by a frigate squadron under Captain Richard Goodwin Keats, in HMS Boadicea.
The first single "I Don't Wanna Know" was based on a sample of "Boadicea" by Enya from her 1987 self-titled album.
Subsequent programmes in the first series were on Boadicea, King Arthur and Alfred the Great, shown with a re-run of Offa over successive nights in March 1980.