"Why Skiing Isn't the Best Option: Discover a More Affordable Adventure!"

WE read recently about a ski resort in the Dolomites that had everything it needed for the upcoming season. Except snow.

Punters were getting out of the lifts at the top of the mountain and finding that instead of skis, they should have been wearing wellies.

Just another perfect day on the slopes, according to JeremyCredit: Getty Jeremy hopes winter travellers have their own flash of enlightenment — and realise that swapping frozen slopes for Caribbean sunshine makes far more sense, and is a damn sight cheaper tooCredit: Getty

Because it was all just mud and rock. And hilariously — well, I thought it was funny — resort bosses kept the lifts running.

More and more people were arriving at the peak, and there was no way they could get back down.

Apparently, it was all getting a bit bad tempered up there.

Ha.

I actually think there’s something wrong with people who go . And I speak as a man who went to the mountains every year for 15 years or more.

But then, one beautiful, sunny day in Zermatt, , I had an epiphany.

I came round a corner, stopped and thought: “I hate this.”

So that evening, I took off my boots and I’ve never skied since.

Part of the problem is that I was never very good at it. I looked like a bus driver taking a dump. And everyone I skied with was very good at it.

So they’d wait for me, and I’d arrive, with my lungs hanging out of my nose and my thighs screaming with pain, and they’d immediately set off, giving me no time to get my breath back.

And then there was all that disgusting food. Melted cheese and bread is not lunch, and why the bloody hell does it cost more than most ?

Of course, you always meet skiing enthusiasts — easy to spot, the sun tan they get makes them look like owls — who tell you that the resort they go to every year is so much better than all the others. But it isn’t.

All skiing resorts are exactly the same. Cold, overpriced and full of people with broken legs.

I also dislike the fanaticism. People want to be on the slopes the moment the lifts open.

I once saw a man in a waiting room with a ski pole sticking out of his eye… is that what you want from a ­holiday? To be blinded?

Why? You don’t get out of bed and hit the beach the moment the sun comes up on a holiday.

You behave like a normal human and get rid of your hangover first.

Speaking of which. People will ski to a mountain restaurant and say, when they get there: “That was a great run. Let’s do it again.”

Noooo. You don’t do that when you walk to the pub. You don’t say: “What a lovely walk, let’s go home and do it again.” You go inside and you have a drink.

Ah, yes, the drinking. I did a lot of that on skiing , to numb the pain in my legs — and as a result, I used to fall over most afternoons. Just when the had all turned to ice.

This is why I became familiar with many Alpine hospitals.

I once saw a man in a waiting room with a ski pole sticking out of his eye.

And is that what you want from a ­holiday? To be blinded?

Or to carry your poles and your skis, and the one glove you haven’t lost back, to the crummy chalet you’ve rented for £2,000 a day while wearing shoes that are less flexible than house bricks.

It makes no sense at all, any of it.

I hope that if you’re planning on going this , you are able to enjoy a moment of enlightenment like I did.

And realise that the in the winter is better.

And a damn sight cheaper.

You trying to stirrup trouble Sir Keir?

Labour’s ‘war on the countryside’ continues with plans to ban trail huntingCredit: Alamy Hunting a scent left by a person might be silly, says Jeremy, but so is cheese-rolling and no one’s planning to ban thatCredit: Getty

THE latest salvo from the Labourites’ war against the countryside, and everyone in it, is to

Now I’m no fan of horses or the people on them but I can’t see what’s wrong with riding around with some that are following the trail of scent left earlier by a person.

It sounds silly but so is cheese-rolling and no one’s planning to ban that.

It’s all part of Labour’s class war and I think that one day they should be given a taste of their own .

So whoever wins the next must please ban kale, avocados, , holidays in Tuscany, fold-away bicycles and . . . the word “comrade”.

Strife on the farm

Labour’s new higher tax threshold will still destroy the countrysideCredit: EPA

SO, the Government has finally and raised the threshold when the tax becomes payable from £1million to £2.5million.

This has been described as a big win for farmers, and it is.

But let’s not forget that half of all farms in the UK will still be hit.

They will still have to be sold when the farmer dies, and who will buy them?

Not another farmer, that’s for sure. It’ll be City types and hedge-funders. Who won’t know how to do .

Farming’s hard, and unless you start at the age of three, you won’t be able to do it very well.

I know this from personal experience.

So the new higher tax threshold will still destroy the countryside.

It’ll affect the country’s ability to feed itself.

And there are still thousands of farmers out there who are having to deal with the stress of knowing that they cannot pass their farm on to the only people who know how to run it. Their children.

And the big question is, why have the tax at all?

The original plan would only have raised £500million a year.

Now, it will only raise £300million, which isn’t even enough to fund the for an afternoon.

A battle, then, has been won. But the fight goes on.

A bunny state of affairs

Campaigners are up in arms over Harrods selling fur toys, even though using a rabbit’s pelt after it’s been eaten might just be the least wasteful option of allCredit: Getty

OH dear. Animal enthusiasts are rushing around, waving their arms in the air and wailing because has been selling soft toys made from actual animal fur.

They say it’s wrong to kill an animal for its fur, and I’m with them on that.

But one of the toys that they’re moaning about is made from rabbit fur. And I can’t see what’s wrong with that, at all.

Because if you kill a rabbit to make it into a stew, it seems silly to throw the fur away. You may as well make it into a toy for your child or a nice scarf.

If that doesn’t appeal, you can always buy clothing made from synthetic fibres. But if you do that, you’re only going to get shouted at by the mob.

I suppose that’s the problem these days.

Whatever you do, someone with pink hair and an “I heart Zack Polanski” badge is going to give you an earful.

It sure is Elon Earth

A report into one of Elon Musk’s rockets exploding over Florida reveals planes were forced to declare emergencies while swerving to avoid falling debris — which rained back to Earth for nearly an hourCredit: Getty A plane flying over Emmerdale Farm exploded and three episodes later, bits of engine and the fuselage were still landing on people’s houses, according to JeremyCredit: ITV

A REPORT into one of Elon Musk’s rockets that exploded over has found that as they swerved to avoid the debris and that bits of the starship were falling back to earth for nearly an hour.

An hour? Really?

I seem to recall many years ago that a plane flying over Emmerdale Farm exploded and three episodes later, bits of engine and the fuselage were still landing on people’s houses.

But that was all staged, for a soap opera. In real life, it only takes a matter of seconds for debris to reach the earth.

But, hey. At least the authors of the report into the Musk-ship ­disaster got their names in the paper. Which I ­suspect was what they wanted most of all.