University challenge

The first London Bulgarian Choir concert of the year is in Cambridge. We’re guests of St Catharine’s College, aka Catz. It’s a great excuse for me and my cousin Veronica, a fellow singer, to bunk off and hit the town early to submerge ourselves in collegiate culture before we’re due at the chapel for the pre-concert run-through.

Catz call

Kettle’s Yard is our first stop, the home of Jim and Helen Ede. Jim had been a curator at the Tate Gallery in the 1920s and 1930s, befriending the likes of Henry Moore and Ben Nicholson and acquiring works by his mates and other artists. The Edes moved to Cambridge in 1956 and transformed four cottages into Kettle’s Yard, as Jim said at the time, ‘a place where people would find a home and a welcome, a refuge of peace and order, of the visual arts and music… in which stray objects, stones glass, pictures, sculpture are arranged in light and space’. The couple later donated the place to the University of Cambridge, and it has been left as it was, the centre of a programme of music and exhibitions. 

The Edes’ home for cherished art and furnishings 

There’s an overwhelming sense of peace and calm, and, walking around, I want to copy every exquisite little detail in my own home. Round grey stones arranged in swirls, awkward alcoves turned into intimate dining spaces, coloured glass pieces catching the setting sun. Sculptures are perfectly positioned and paintings hang in beautiful groups, a Miro here, a Moore there. People are scattered about the place reading art books and catalogues. 

No stone left unturned

Crystal palace

Casually placed canvas

We drag ourselves away to take a look at an exhibition in the adjoining gallery. It turns out to be equally contemplative, on the landscape artist and poet Ian Hamilton Finlay. He and his wife designed a garden in front of their home in the Scottish Borders, placing sculptures and stones carved with poems among the plants and trees. They called it Little Sparta and the show features images and a film of the garden.

Stone work by Finlay

Next, we move on to Peterhouse, my father Eric’s old college. He was a fellow there in the late 1940s to early 1950s, and honed his rock climbing skills on the perimeter walls when he failed to make it back before the gate was locked.

Peterhouse sunset

I stop for a Chelsea bun at Dad’s favourite café, Fitzbillies, just along the road. This place is a Cambridge institution and, as such, was stuffed to the gills with trippers and tourists.

Daddy cool

The concert is an atmospheric one. There are dozens of music students in the audience, which is a little daunting for us, but everyone seems transported. Little do they know that we haven’t sung together since Christmas, as our leader has been on maternity leave. Luckily we’re the only ones aware of the bum notes and at the drinks after the concert, people approach us with faces alive and eyes shining. I think we got away with it…

Buon appetito!

I’m sure it’s possible to find food that is below par in an Italian ski resort, but I don’t know which one. Every time I ski there, I’m served the most deliciously simple fare, and it leaves a lasting impression.

Our destination is Champoluc, an hour or two’s drive north of Turin. The road zigzags up the side of the Aosta valley where Champoluc sits at the north-western end of Italy’s answer to Les Trois Vallées – Monterosa Ski (the other two linked resorts are Gressoney and Alagna).

Monterosa panorama

We’re staying at the Breithorn, an old and grand chalet-style building with creaky wooden floors and giant fireplaces throughout. Family company Ski Total has taken over the building for the season, and the meals follow their Europe-wide menu. It would be hard to beat their breakfast of cereals, fruit, pastires, cold cuts and hot options. Great for setting you up for a morning on the slopes.

Our hotel has rusty charm

We’re most fortunate with the weather, not to mention our guide Simone, who turns out to be the world’s fastest man on skis. He's keeping his need for speed in check today, though. I can't do piste-bashing without a mid-morning hot beverage to look forward to. 

Down to Gressoney

The fastest man on skis

Which brings us to elevenses. None of that watery brew here. The cup is filled with real melted chocolate, then filled to the brim with whipped cream. 

Hot choc heaven

Lunch is accorded just as much attention to detail. There's one very long and spectacularly delicious one at Le Rascard Frantze, in a tiny hamlet above Champoluc. There's no road to the place so we ski in… then ski out a few hours later. 

Scenes of the resort's farming past

A family owned place, the mouthwatering menu is happily tweaked for the vegetarian. There are guest bedrooms upstairs and the building's old farming details have been lovingly preserved, from the stone mushrooms to keep the vermin away from the grain, to the old bread oven with its handy wooden rack – again, to keep the animals off the loaves.

Rat catchers

Old bread oven

Bread rack turned glove stash

Another day we lunch at what must be Italy's only alpine restaurant with a Tibetan menu, at Campo Base, where the prayer flags flutter in the breeze. It's a slow ski down after that one. 

Taste of Tibet

Half way down I spot a piste sign that reminds me of Scotland – just the thing for my Happy Robert Burns Day messages. 

Ode to a moos

Auld Lang Syne

I try not to miss out on Hogmanay in the Highlands. The weather forecast is usually anyone’s guess but I always manage to fit in a few of my favourite places. And though it’s more than 30 years since I lived anywhere but London, it still feels like I’m going home.

This year we arrive on 31 December on the direct train from London, arriving into Aviemore at 19:27. We find there’s been a bit of a mix up with the new ‘zero tolerance’ drink-driving laws, and my siblings are already over the limit. Our family house is in the middle of nowhere, which is how we end up celebrating the bells in a bird hide on the edge of our loch. Appropriately enough, it’s a hoot. We move on to first-foot the neighbours and stagger home at 4am.

Dawn chorus

The new-year holiday improves day-by-day as we visit old haunts, high and low. Loch Vaa is our next nearest loch, a secret place enclosed by trees. It’s often frozen in winter, and we’ll tramp through the snow with our ice skates to do a few circuits and enjoy the childish delight of being able to skate in and out of the boathouse. There’s no ice this time, so our circuit is on foot.

Loch Vaa by the boathouse

Craigellachie is a hill that is a constant presence in Aviemore, looming right over the village and rewarding a quick but steep climb with superb views over the valley. It’s blowing a hoolie when we climb it on New Year’s Day.

On top of Craigellachie

Wind angel on Craigellachie

Meall a’ Bhuachaille is a mountain I grew up knowing very well. We kids built shelters in the forest at its fringes. We knew all the footpaths, firebreaks and lookout towers. It’s another one of those quick, steep climbs, and there’s light snow underfoot the day my sister and I take it on. Sometimes the view makes you feel like God looking down from the heavens, deeply happy with how beautifully it has all worked out.

On top of Meall a’ Bhuachaille

Worth every step

Even the views on a flattish stroll the three miles from Aviemore back to the house can prove spectacular in the right light, across the lush green of the golf course to the snow-covered Cairngorms. The Highlands never disappoint.

Course of nature

The light fantastic

The streets of Dartmouth are dappled year round with interesting light and shadow, but the low angle of the winter sunshine creates the most pleasing effects of all.

The long view

We’re here between Christmas and New Year to stay with Chris’s father and his wife in their candy coloured, terraced townhouse, enjoying views from our bedroom over to the Royal Naval College and up-river. It’s a time of seasonal drinks parties and long, lazy pub lunches, with occasional rambles to work off the excesses.

 Drinks party aspect

The town winds down the steep hillsides on either side of the mouth of the River Dart, offering up views in captivating slices.

 Slice of life

Down by the quayside, a cobbled stretch of road is backed by a row of houses in pastel shades. This part of Dartmouth frequently stands in for 18^th-century ports in Poldark-style costume dramas. It’s not too hard to imagine tricorn-hatted seafaring types striding purposefully along the waterfront.

Dartmouth’s old quayside

One day we walk the few miles overland to Dittisham, a tiny village clustered around a bend in the Dart. Its pub, the Ferry Inn, juts out over the shore and at peak times all human life jostles up and down the jetty, from daytrippers out of Totnes and Dartmouth to children baiting crabs, buckets and legs dangling over the sides.

Chris and the Jubilee Beacon

Looking towards Torquay

Dittisham’s Ferry Inn

We stay so long in the pub that it’s dusk by the time we catch the boat up river to town. On the way, someone spots a pontoon-load of chubby seals, who lazily glance over as we motor by, the dark water swirling and Dartmouth’s lights twinkling in the distance.

Seals bedding down

One of the Dart’s many boatyards

Some guy

I always enjoy spending Halloween and Guy Fawkes back home. Here we don't Trick or Treat – we go guising. Guising in Scotland dates back to the 19th century and involves visiting your neighbours in fancy dress and performing a turn to earn sweeties. When I was little, we'd sing songs or recite poems, but these days a quick joke seems to be more the norm. No doubt it was this tradition that was exported, then gradually Americanised, by Scottish and Irish emigrants. So far, guising holds sway north of the border, but it can only be a matter of time.  

Muffins that Fungus the Bogeyman would be proud of

In the old days, before the Americans sent us pumpkins, we carved our Halloween lanterns out of turnips (for turnip, if you're English, think swede ). As a veg, it's a toughie. Each lantern was a good few hours' work and the smell, when lit, was like something from the bottom of the compost heap.

Guisers, walk this way

With our jolly pumpkin perched on the gatepost, a steady stream of children call at my brother's place in Nethybridge. Jokes are told, outfits explained (because it's never quite clear what they've come as), treats distributed, and my green muffins turn out to be quite revolting.  

Jokes recited, sweets earned

A few days later, it's Guy Fawkes and I must say, the bonfires up here are just that little bit more menacing. I'm taken along to the display at Boat of Garten where the bonfire reaches an extraordinary height. The guy on the top is so lifelike, we're quite unnerved to see flames licking around his feet, then taking off up his trouser-legs. 

Crowds at the Boat of Garten bonfire

Spookily realistic guy takes to the flames

Burning was too good for the real Guy Fawkes, but he saved himself from the horror of being hung, drawn and quartered, by jumping off the scaffold to his death. Tonight we toast his failure with mulled wine...

Go with the flow

The River Findhorn, which flows from the Monadhliath mountains to the Moray Firth, is one of the longest rivers in Scotland and its turbulent waters are a big hit with anglers and canoeists. But I'm here to explore a section roughly half way along, and to learn a little of its eventful history.

It's the perfect season for this woodland walk. Rainy mist hangs in the air, the river is dramatically high, and through the trees we glimpse its dark waters swirling noisily. Underfoot is a thick carpet of rich autumn leaves, with bright evergreens poking through.

Highland autumn colours

High above the Findhorn's curves

At one point the river has carved a dramatic gorge and the path branches off to precipitous lookout points with ancient looking railings to keep you from plunging to your doom. 

Lionine shapes below the gorge

The entrance to the gorge, and the narrowest section of the river, is known as Randolph's Leap, named after the Earl of Moray, Thomas Randolph. Back in the 14th century, a family of disgruntled nobles decided to attack Randolph and gathered a 1,000-strong army, crossing to their opponent's side of the river. Randolph ambushed the army and forced the ringleaders to retreat by jumping back across the river at this narrow section.

Randolph's Leap

Water awaits the next surge in dark pools

There are two memorials, or Flood Stones, to be found along this section, which commemorate the Moray floods of 1829. Following three days of rain in early August the River Findhorn and its tributaries rose to an enormous height, causing devastation throughout the valley. At Randolph's Leap the level rose by 50 feet, and is marked by in two places by Flood Stones. The power of the water must have been phenomenal – huge boulders transported upriver as if made of balsa wood.

Flood Stone marks the highest water in 1829

This section of the river runs through the Logie estate, owned and managed by descendants of Sir Alexander Grant, a canny baker who ended up running McVitie's biscuits –famously inventing the Digestive. Back in the 1980s, the family turned disused farm buildings into a hub of retail and workshop spaces, with a heritage centre for those curious about the history of the area. Logie Steading has become a huge draw, and if you've been tramping the ups and downs of the Findhorn's riverside trail, in true Sir Alex tradition, its cafe does baked goodies to die for.