Pietro Proserpio may be 80-years-old but his youthful soul twinkles in his eyes and it’s there in his cheeky grin. With a passion for mechanics and art, he continues to create and enchant visitors from around the world – and I was one of them.

Weeks of seemingly endless rain have created bumper crops of mushrooms in our local woods, so when friends invited me to join in the hunt, I couldn’t resist. “Bring your walking boots and wet-weather gear as there’s going to be lots of mud!” they laughed. I dug around the bottom of my drawer and found my old waterproof pants, thick …

Chilled to my bones as I trudged through deep snow in the Austrian Tyrol, I was overjoyed to see an old friend …