ACTOR and adventurer Brian Blessed has told why he jumped at the chance to become president of a Derbyshire preservation group.

The 71-year-old film and TV star joined the Friends of the Cromford Canal yesterday for a sponsored walk.

Brian, who is president of the group, which wants to restore the whole waterway from Langley Mill to Cromford, said: "I pay homage to the people who started this. I have never said yes to something so quickly. I did because it just melted my heart, the whole thought of it."

The trust, formed in 2002, has a vision of a Cromford Canal fully restored to navigation and reconnected to the national waterways system.

In February, the trust celebrated a victory when planning consent was granted to transform a river diversion channel into a waterway more than a kilometre long to link with the canal at Pinxton.

The channel was due to be filled in but Friends of the Cromford Canal fought for 21 months to retain it as a canal. The charity now has to raise a money, which could amount to £50,000, to make this happen.

Speaking at the canalside, Brian said: "It's a privilege to meet these people and be president of such a marvellous project. Britain is one of the most green countries in the world but nevertheless bits of our countryside are still being lost on a massive scale, such as to huge motorways.

"I feel there are huge battles to be fought in Britain to preserve our countryside and the fact that this community wants to save this canal is a beacon.

"I love the fact that these people are waking up the sleeping beauty."

Brian has performed many roles with the Royal Shakespeare Company. His screen career includes playing Prince Vultan in film Flash Gordon, the mad comic figure of Richard IV in the TV series Blackadder and Spiro in the BBC adaptation of My Family and Other Animals.

He is an intrepid climber, having scaled Kilimanjaro, and he has also trekked to the North Pole. He is currently planning to climb the volcano Sangay, in Ecuador, which erupts every 14 minutes.

Brian, who now lives in Chobham, Surrey, but grew up in Mexborough, near Doncaster, said he spent a lot of time beside canals as a child.

He said: "I used to come here on my racing Raleigh bike. Canals have a magic of their own. What appealed to me about this canal is that nowhere else do you have 14 miles of level water. It is a tremendous engineering feat that you couldn't equal today."

Mike Kelley, vice-chairman of the Friends of the Cromford Canal, said the group had approached Brian because of the actor's fondness for the area.

He said: "Brian brings attention to the group."

The six-mile walk started at Langley Mill canal basin and finished at Pinxton Wharf, near the Boat Inn. The Frederick Gent School Band performed at the end of the walk.