After successfully auditioning yesterday as stunt double for Eddie the Eagle I was somewhat nervous this morning when we returned to the slopes of lovely Sauze d'Oulx. But also heartened to wake to another postcard-perfect day, with the snowy mountains glaringly white in the bright morning sun, with not a breath of wind. Along with the rest of Italy we queued up for the quad chairlift. Someone yesterday had told me that this was likely to be the busiest ski week...

Trees, blue sky and snow jostled for position in my field of view as I slid backwards in a vague upside down W shape, trying to arrest my fall. It couldn't go on forever - I knew the slope levelled out eventually - though it would possibly be long enough for my whole life to flash before my eyes, in slow motion. I tried - in vain, as it happened - to dig something Into the slope, a ski, a pole, tried to twist on my side o give less sliding surface area (scienti...

Grrr on a Train As I mentioned yesterday, I like travelling by train. I'm not sure I will be an as-enthusiastic passenger on Elon Musk's Hyperloop, where speed sacrifices views and you get to your destination in a long seamless tube at supersonic speeds, but then again the Hyperloop is still very much in the experimental stage. I may not be on the platform when the first one pulls (surges? launches? vrooms?) out of its station. But your everyday common-ou-jardi...