THE husband of Bolton Castaway Erica Hurst says he is happy for her to pursue her TV dream on one condition.

"She's never leaving me for three months again," joked Matthew Williams.

He was speaking after viewers caught their first glimpse of Erica, aged 22, settling into life with 12 other castaways on New Zealand's remote Great Barrier Island last night.

The BBC show, Castaway, will follow their fortunes over the next three months.

They will be building their own shelter, growing and collecting their food and using the land and ocean to feed themselves.

Presented by Danny Wallace, it began last night on BBC1 but will run every night from Monday to Thursday on BBC3.

Matthew, a nightclub security manager, from Lostock, tied the knot with the former lapdancer in Las Vegas on February 5 after a whirlwind romance. The couple met at Manchester's trendy Warehouse Project club in October.

Matthew, aged 24, said: "By December, we had decided to settle down together but we never planned on getting married until we got to America.

"We were in New York, where I took her shopping for a ring. We got tattoos with each other's names and then we went over to Vegas."

They almost never got there. A mix-up over airline tickets led to them having to change airlines and pay an extra £600 each.

Matthew said: "We nearly couldn't afford the wedding."

Erica had little time to plan their honeymoon before the BBC told her she had been picked to take part in the second series of their reality show.

"We'd only been back in Britain three weeks when she went away," Matthew said.

"It's not the best feeling in the world but it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Erica. I knew from day one she was auditioning."

Matthew said his wife will have no trouble coping with the conditions on the island, where the 13 castaways - joined by one viewer during the 12-week run - will use their individual skills to develop their community.

Unlike Big Brother, the Castaway experiment has no evictions and no overall winner. But Erica will be hoping to follow in the footsteps of Ben Fogle, who went on to a successful TV presenting career after starring in the original series in 2000 which ran for a year.

Matthew hopes he can have Erica to himself for a fortnight's honeymoon when she returns in June.