A special drive to Tenerife South Airport
This was a shorter and slightly different livestream as I drove Kevin the Scotsman to Tenerife South Airport at the end of his latest visit. Kevin had recently reached the huge milestone of 100,000 subscribers, so there was plenty to talk about on the way.
His journey home was not exactly simple. From Tenerife he was flying to Manchester, then travelling by train through Preston and Glasgow Central before finally reaching Paisley. He expected to get home late in the evening and admitted he was too tired to film the full journey this time.
Remembering the early days
Kevin thanked me for mentioning his channel when he had fewer than 100 subscribers. We also remembered one of his first live broadcasts with a 360-degree camera and the moment he was encouraged to stop hiding behind music and start speaking on camera.
That change clearly worked. Kevin has built a large and loyal audience, although reaching exactly 100,000 became a funny story of its own. After asking the 100,000th subscriber to leave a comment, he realised everyone might wait for somebody else to press the button. A flight video eventually brought in enough new viewers to help him cross the line.
More Tenerife videos are coming
Kevin still has several videos from the trip to publish, including time with Webby in Puerto Colón, a walk from Fañabé to Las Américas and more hotel and walking videos.
He explained that he is now making fewer videos but letting them run longer, partly because so much of his audience watches YouTube on a television.
We compared notes on watch time and audience retention, and I explained the workflow I have been using to turn livestreams into shorter editable clips with Final Cut Pro captions, ChatGPT and imported XML projects.
The missing camera comes back
One of the best stories was the return of Kevin’s missing camera. His father collected it from lost property in Glasgow, where there was a £25 fee for electronics.
It was still a good result for a camera worth several hundred pounds, but the charge certainly caused a reaction in the car.
Kevin had borrowed one of my cameras during the Tenerife trip. At the airport he explained that without it, many of the videos from this visit would never have been made.
That led to a warm thank-you and a promise that he will return later in the year, hopefully with time for dinner and an appearance on Balcony Banter.
A final airport surprise
Before leaving, Kevin mentioned the new Greggs at Tenerife South Airport. Unfortunately, it is beyond security, so I could not simply park, buy a pie and drive home.
Kevin had already managed to get an early look by filming through a small gap in the shutters before it officially opened.
After the farewell, I ended the airport special rather than driving alone with the loose camera setup in the car. The morning continued with a separate coffee livestream back nearer the village.
More Tenerife stories, livestreams and local information are available at https://timothydowd.com