WHILE the UK endures a cold snap, a family from Bolton will be starring in Channel 4's A New Life in the Sun next week.

Film crews documented Stephen and Tina Clinton, who moved to Portugal in October 2019, as they built a holiday village in the Algarve.

Stephen previously worked as a store manager in Asda while Tina was a department head at building management firm but the pair had always dreamed of embarking on an adventure.

In fact the couple actually met in Portugal when Stephen, from Little Lever, was on holiday and Tina, from Manchester, was working behind a bar.

They bought their first home in Little Lever soon after, and later lived in Radcliffe.

They had owned a holiday home in Albufeira but found it more and more difficult to return to the UK.

After raising funds from selling their UK home and their Portuguese house they moved into another property with 12,000sqm of land in February 2020 and began building their holiday village,Casa Branca, completing the build in August.

The couple have two sons, six-year-old Patrick and Joseph, one, who was born in Portugal.

Stephen said: "We'd always wanted to create an environment which allowed us to spend more time outdoors with the children and our parents so creating a holiday village allowed us to do that.

"Making memories is so important to us and that is what we want to give back to our visiting guests.

"After seeing an advertisement for the show we completed a video interview and were chosen to take part.

"We were filmed for five months, they were amazing to work with and captured pretty much everything.

"Absolutely nothing was staged, they caught the highs but also the lows.

"At the beginning it felt very strange as you're always miked up so privacy was quite hard, but they were very professional.

"I recall one day losing track of time and forgetting to pick up Patrick from school and out of the blue the camera appeared as they had heard me in panic talking to Tina about it.

"We're really excited about being on TV, it's been a tough year for many but having the opportunity to show that you can follow your dreams and make a difference is very important."

A New Life in the Sun will be broadcast on Channel 4 from Monday January 4.