Parasailing, water skiing, hot air ballooning and now charging around the US in a dog sled - there's nothing this extreme sport loving 88-year-old great grandmother from north Watford won't try.

Adventurous Doreen Alexander, of Berry Avenue, most recently travelled to snow-capped mountains in Oregon, where she battled through a blizzard and freezing temperatures to rangle a pack of huskies around the formidable Mount Bachelor.

The former Leggatts Way School pupil enjoyed the trek with several of her family, as they commanded a troop of four sleds through the town of Bend.

Doreen said it was an "amazing experience" and told her family, who live in America, "we have to do this again - God willing".

But dog sledding was just the latest in a string of adventures Doreen - who has five grandchildren and six great grandchildren - has undertaken, having previously visited France, Italy, Malta, Majorca, Switzerland, Bermuda, and Spain.

She shamed her daughter in Mexico when she became the first in the family to go parasailing.

Her family watched in awe as Doreen was hooked up to the parachute and tied to a speed boat, after a brief sprint along the beach she was whipped up into the sky.

In her sixties, she attempted water skiing behind a motor boat on a lake in Wisconsin.

She managed to get out of the water on to the skies quite well, but had a bit of difficultly standing up, so she skied the entire time scrunched down on the skies without giving up until indicated by the driver to let go of the rope.

She has been up in a hot air balloon twice, once in Wisconsin and once in Nevada.

She and her late husband Richard travelled extensively to the US, completing more than 50 round trips and Atlantic crossings to Chicago, New York, Cleveland, Miami, Las Vegas, Palm Springs, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Colorado, Wisconsin, Portland and Bend in Oregon and Reno in Nevada.

But Doreen has had an adventurous spirit her whole life. In her teenage years, during the Second World War blitz, she assisted her mother on Black Watch duty - walking the streets at night together to make sure neighbours had their curtains drawn closed.

After the war, Doreen married and lived in Woodside, but divorced and began her life with second husband Richard.

Richard died after almost 40 years of marriage and Doreen now shares her time between Watford and her partner Ted's home in Wales.