Starting his career in theatre at the age of 15, George Baker, 75, went on to star in films such as The Dam Busters and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. In 1988, he became DCI Wexford in ITV’s The Ruth Rendell Mysteries. ITV3 is currently broadcasting Inspector Wexford — All the Mysteries on Mondays at 10pm. The father of five daughters, Baker has married for the third time, to Louie Ramsay, who plays his on-screen wife, Dora Wexford

MY EARLIEST holidays were all around Bulgaria, where I was born. My father was British vice-consul there and also a trader. Our villa was by the Black Sea on a beautiful stretch of sand outside Varan, which is a big tourist place now, so there wasn’t much necessity to go away for holidays. When I was about nine, my father went for three weeks through Bulgaria selling his cotton yarn and stuff, and he took me and my brother Frank with him.

We travelled in his open-top Fiat. It was quite unusual to see a car in those days, certainly in the villages. We visited the monastery at Rila and called at Plovdiv in central Bulgaria, where there’s an old ruined fortress overlooking the plain. And we stayed in very nice hotels, which usually had a restaurant.

One night, my father said: “Do you know how they make shish kebab? Well, the cooks are all very fat and they put a little bit of oil on their stomachs with a little bit of flour, and they roll the meatballs down their stomachs and into the frying pan.”

Well, of course, we didn’t believe him. So he said: “All right, I’ll prove it to you.” When the waiter came out to take the order, father pretended that he’d forgotten what a shish kebab was called. “You know the stuff I mean,” he said, rolling his hands down his stomach and into a pan, as it were. The waiter replied: “This is a respectable restaurant, Mr Baker!” It was a wonderful trip and I remember that holiday very well indeed. Then the war came and we were separated from our father, who stayed behind while we went to live in England. He was later killed in Cairo, in 1943. We had a very difficult war: we had 18 homes in five years and no holidays, certainly.

In the early 1950s, I went down to the Camargue, near Marseilles, and developed a love for that part of the south of France. I’ve returned on occasion all my life. My most memorable holiday was 13 years ago. After Louie and I married, I took her on honeymoon — a driving holiday — to my very favourite places. We went from Marseilles to Les Baux and one or two other places, then across the Alpes-Maritimes through the Gorges du Verdon, which is one of the most memorable drives you can have. “Lou,” I said, “before we go, dear, I’m going to take you to Amsterdam, because you’ve got to see the Van Gogh Museum before we go to Arles and all the places he painted.” So we went, and it was delightful, because Louie suddenly became like a little girl and said: “Why didn’t anybody tell me that Amsterdam was so beautiful? What’s the matter with everybody? Amsterdam is more beautiful than Paris!” Then we went on the driving holiday.

Everybody thinks that Van Gogh is an impressionist. But if you drive through Arles and up into the mountains where he painted, round Les Baux, you’ll see that the colour of the sky, the colour of the sunflowers and the colour of the ochre in the ground are all just as dazzling as his paintings. He wasn’t an impressionist at all, he just painted what he saw.

Now Louie and I have come to a bit of an old age, we’ve suddenly got tired of rushing off and seeing Leonardo da Vinci at the Louvre or the like. We go on holiday to have a rest now, not for the sightseeing. So we’ve had a time- share in Madeira for the past four or five years. Madeira is a glorious place — wonderful flowers, marvellous country, extraordinary walks and drives, and the people are so nice. And six years ago we discovered Fuerteventura, which is also very relaxing. It’s a volcanic island and there are one or two places to go and see, but that’s it. Otherwise, you either go down to the beach or you sit by the pool. If you are tired and actually need a rest, you can do it without feeling guilty. You wake up and say, “I’m going to read this book.

I don’t have to see a grand statue or a wonderful carving or another glorious ceiling to worry about. I can just stay where I am.”

• George Baker talked to Rosanna Greenstreet