I hate the cold. I can't stand it. I get chilblains. My fingers go blue, my hands get chapped. My ears hurt. All this happens in the mild West Country. God help me in proper snow. The last time I went skiing, I was 18. I stayed in a basic chalet in Montgenèvre in France. I was trapped in a snowdrift, having fallen off the button lift, and had to be mountain rescued. My saviours said they had only found me because they could hear my swearing echoing in the mountain passes.
I had thought, never again. But my week in the Alta Badia region of the Dolomites was the luxury, no-effort-required version of skiing. No lazy chalet girls who refuse to clean your room. No cold, given the modern technology now stitched into every pair of salopettes — in the 70s, I was a Lycra-free zone in scratchy wool. The ski lifts no longer seem to lurch. And not a bowl of raclette in sight.
But as well as all this comfort, the area oozes history. Many people still speak Ladin, the closest language to Latin. There are 1200km of pistes and 450 lifts. Alta Badia is a region made up of six Tyrolean villages, and the altitude means there is good snow early and late. I went in February and it snowed every day: big, fat, dry flakes. The map said I was in Italy, but it felt Austrian. I am sure in summer people wear leather shorts and yellow plaits and drink beer.
The Rosa Alpina hotel opened in 1939. It is still run by the Pizzinini family, and there are photos everywhere of people in knitted trousers, with wooden ski poles. The hotel staff are incredibly sweet and accommodating. I was very anxious about going for my first lesson (Where is the bus? How will I recognise my instructor?) but they were very patient. The spa was top class, too: I had a fantastic facial, and the therapist was of that rare breed who would suggest all sorts of extra things I needed done while there - 'A moustache wax? The rough skin on your feet?'
But the biggest draw at this hotel, apart from the snow, of course, is the food. Alta Badia has three Michelin-starred restaurants within a 20km radius and although I felt a bit of a plonker sat by myself in the hotel's St Hubertus restaurant (two stars), the chef, Norbert Niederkofler, was unfazed by my announcement that I am vegan: I had about six courses each night, of risotto, pasta, tiny spears of asparagus, alpine strawberries...
