Screenwriter John Fusco followed in Marco Polo's footsteps across China and Mongolia before writing a Netflix TV series about the explorer. Here he shares personal stories and snaps from the adventure

How did your trip along the Silk Road first come about?

It began with my son when he was six or seven years old. He had a deep interest in the Mongol Empire - it was his absolute love. My own childhood love was Marco Polo, and because the two come together we used to talk a lot about them. Then, in 2007, I was shooting a movie called The Forbidden Kingdom in China. I had gone up and explored part of the Silk Road in Dunhuang by myself, and had done some exploring on camel with a group. Through my contacts on the film set, I was able to find a guide who specialised in taking journalists way out to the Taiga Forest to find shamans and things like that. So my son went up to Ulan Bator and from there we went with our guide. We drove for about nine hours out into central Mongolia and stayed in gers - or yurts, the Turkish word, which has become more popular. We had quite a few adventures just securing our horses: the wrangler who was supposed to meet us didn't show up, so we ended up making a deal with a local nomad and securing some half-wild horses. Fortunately my son and I are both horsemen, so we were able to ride them down part of central Mongolia and back to Ulan Bator. It was such an amazing experience.

What kind of tips would you give to someone who wanted to do the same journey?

Reach out to a guide and let them know that you want to see the true Mongolia, to travel to ger camps and stay with families. That's an interesting experience because sometimes you're going to be accepted and welcome to stay, and other times you have to just keep riding to the next one. I would suggest beginning in Ulan Bator, the capital, and going by vehicle 10 to 12 hours out to central Mongolia, and then riding back to Ulan Bator, and looking for family encampments. Some guides know the Silk Road or will take you to Karakorum, the old capital, where you get to see the remains of the Genghis Khan Empire. There are some other Tibetan Buddhist empires along the way, an unbelievable amount of wild Mongolian horses, and just very diverse terrain; it's quite wonderful.

Do you have any stand-out anecdotes from the trip?

At one point we became separated from the support vehicle that would usually meet us at a certain time each day to replenish our water supply. We were therefore out of water, and all the riverbeds were dry in the height of summer. I had my 13-year-old son with me and I was just thinking, 'Thank God his mother doesn't know this is going on right now'. The nomad, who had provided the horses, was basically helping to lead the trip at that point. He remembered an old well from when he was a kid, over at a distant ranch. The only problem was that the ranch was quite a distance off, we could see it on the horizon and we were starting to lose daylight. I remember our guide and this local nomad looking at me, and they said, 'Your son's going to have to man up - we're going to have to make this ride at full gallop and beat the sun, because there's just no water'. It was such a coming of age moment for my son; he's now 20 and he wrote his college admission essay based on that experience. He called it 'Riding for Water', because it was a pivotal moment in his life, when he really believed it was coming down to survival.

Did you make it before dark?

It was just dark, and you know what? When we got to the well it was being guarded by a wild Mongolian stallion and his harem of mares. So Bart, the nomad, had to use a horse whip and drive the stallion back from the well so we could get in and fill a [water]skin. From there we were able to find another homestead in a ger out in the middle of nowhere.

Did any of this feed into Marco Polo?

So much of it really did. Just getting insight into the Mongolian horse culture, watching the way in which these riders relate to their animals. I learned so much history and cultural detail that seven years later, when we were starting to shoot Marco Polo, I tracked down our guide and hired him as our Mongolian cultural advisor. We had this great reunion and my son came out from NYU film school to work on the show too. To be out there, to ride the step, to taste that dust and smell it and live it, you know, it all informed the work. And I consider Dunhuang my favourite city in all of China. A lot of people kind of look at me; it's like a head scratcher, you know, when there's Shanghai and Beijing. But the Silk Road history of Dunhuang and the fact that it hasn't changed all that much gives you a real window into Marco Polo's journeys.

John Fusco

You also filmed in Venice, Kazakhstan and Malaysia: do you have any tips for people visiting those places?

In Venice, the Marco Polo history is all around you, but it's not really promoted. So few people know anything about Marco Polo and his true history, but it's there if you look for it, if you really dig down. Maybe after [Marco Polo] comes out that will change. His home is there, and we were actually filming in the canals where he grew up. The church where he was buried is there. Then Kazakhstan… what a magnificent, magnificent land, one of the last vestiges of the horse cultures of the step - it's why we selected that location to represent Mongolia. The city of Almaty is also a stop along the Silk Road, so it ties into the Silk Road itinerary, and it's a wonderful Kazakh city. From Almaty, after four or five hours, you can really get out to the heartland of the step and see magnificent sights like Sharyn Canyon and small little villages. Again, you'll feel like you're riding back through time.

Which scenes in Marco Polo are you most proud of and where were they shot?

There are just so many. We were able to get into parts of Venice that tourists don't get to see, and shoot period-accurate architecture. There's one sequence that gives me chills every time I see it because I feel like we're conjuring the spirit of where this whole story began. In Kazakhstan, any of the mounted Mongolian march scenes really makes me think back to Kazakhstan with excitement. I remember looking at the first raw footage from the helicopter, and I'd never seen such an expanse without running into a telephone wire or anything. Kazakhstan is just so vast. Then in Malaysia, we got to shoot pretty much in the jungle. We used a lot of incredibly lush palm forests and river basin lands to replicate our south China scenes, and those are spectacular in their own right.

Marco Polo premieres on from 12.01am on Friday 12 December, exclusively on Netflix. Watch the trailer.