My annual skate is being put on ice

Splat! That's the sound of me ice-skating and it's a noise that has been heard for the last time throughout this city. Until now, custom dictated that I stumble inelegantly around the rink for 59 minutes, trying not to take out small infants, then, just as I congratulate myself on finally breaking the curse, hit the deck as the clock strikes the hour and the ice is at its slushiest. People hoist me to my feet and ask if I'm all right; weighed down with ice and humiliation. I repeat, ad nauseam: "No, no, I'm fine, really," and limp off to drink lukewarm hot chocolate. It's fun.

But from now on I'm going to leave ice-skating to my enthusiastic colleague Laura Craik and her family. I wouldn't go skiing or attempt the Argentine tango without a few lessons first, so what makes ice-skating such a magnet for the ill-prepared amateur? I'm adamant: no more going nowhere with a bunch of strangers, waiting for the falling-down moment.

Instead, I shall sit and appreciate the charm of the venue and applaud Craik Junior who, at the age of two, already outclasses me. I might make a mildly bored spectator but at least I'll be warm, dry and undamaged, and my hot chocolate will be, well, hot.

Whenever I think of ice rinks I picture Henry Raeburn's black-clad Reverend Robert Walker, elegantly skating on a mountain-fringed loch, under an ambiguous evening sky, but the reality nowadays is more likely to be inelegant, brightly dressed youngsters and old birds on one of the temporary surfaces in front of a handsome historic building under brilliant arc lights.

One of the most attractive rinks is at Kew Gardens. At night you can sense curious wildlife gathering just outside the range of the lights, attracted by the noise and movement. The Somerset House rink inside the courtyard is pleasing but a touch treeless for my taste, and the Natural History Museum ice is stuck alongside the hellish Cromwell Road.

There's a rink at the Tower this year, as well as one at Hampton Court. I haven't been to either but they might both have a good atmosphere, depending on whether the ghosts who inhabit the old stones are feeling frisky or not. Triple salkos with Sir Thomas More, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard at the Tower would be a laugh, especially if they all had their heads under their arms. Or better still, each other's. I'll send the Craik family to check them out.

And in case I'm coming across as a bit of a wimp, I'd like to point out that I still ski. But I've had a few lessons at that, and although my body remembers every bone-crunching fall it has ever taken, at least when I ski I hardly ever end up back where I started from.