Day 174, 25 December 2012, Club Med Tignes, France. Thankfully slightly cooler today - the April temperatures have disappeared and far more sensible winter temps have prevailed. Aside from it being a lot colder, there were less skiers stripping off on the slopes. Seriously! I had a lazy day reading, napping, swimming in the pool and hitting the sauna and steam room. James powered on for a half morning of skiing and I met him slopeside just before lunch for gl...

Day 173, 24 December 2012, Tignes, France - Christmas Eve! Oh What a Day.... Late December back in '63.... OK enough of the soundtrack. In Europe, Christmas Eve is the big deal and it doesn't come much bigger than at Club Med Tignes. We arrived at the restaurant for breakfast to the sound of singing Elves - pointy hats, pointy shoes, trousers with fur trim. Definitely elves - freshly squeezed orange juice (pretty darn busy elves too - apparently they'd finishe...

Day 172, 23 December 2012, Tignes, Espace Killy - Les Alpes Francaise. Today we looked out the window in wonderment - almost half a metre of snow had fallen overnight at our little chalet in La Reculaz, on the shores of Lac du Chevril (pictured). There is now around a metre of snow sitting on the rooftops around us and it looks like layer upon layer of puff pastry. Many buildings even have signs advising that snow might fall from above. But truly it's not the...

Day 171, 22 December 2012. Val D'Isere, Les Alpes Francaise. Yay! Made it. The ski train is simply the best way to get from wet old London to blue sky, sunshine and mountains of snow overnight. Departure from St Pancras went smoothly - though if anyone plans booking this trip themselves, book carriage 1 or 2 or anything less than 15 - because the platform is MILES long and ski gear is VERY heavy. 'Nuff said. Both so tired that we actually caught a fair bit...

Day 113, 25 October 2012. Saint Lo - Caen (automobile). Caen to Paris (train), Paris to Charles de Gaulle Airport (automobile) and Paris to Cork, Ireland - That's right folks, it's travel day and officially "Planes, Trains and Automobiles!" Today was the first and only hiccup in our French travel plans... a train strike. Why we asked? Who knows - pay, conditions, holidays, possibly the weather... couldn't be the fabulous infrastructure they have at their finge...