THE SCILLY ISLES: Magical ruggedness and beauty

Jul 22 2008 by Mark Thomas, Liverpool Daily Post

Mark Thomas pays a return visit to the Scilly Isles, and hopes they live up to his 30-year-old memories

THE last time I set foot on the Scilly Isles, Huyton MP and former Prime Minister Sir Harold Wilson was still a familiar sight roaming the main island of St Mary’s with his wife, Mary, and their trademark pet Labrador.

As a young man, that holiday seemed to me like a great adventure, sleeping under canvas and supplementing pub meals with delicious al fresco feasts of mackerel I had pulled from the sea with a light spinning rod just a couple of hours earlier.

They were carefree days, hopping from one island to another on the open ferry boats that chugged around this enchanted cluster of islands. We sunbathed on deserted, golden beaches, walked for miles on unspoilt pathways round remote and rugged coastlines, and found great hospitality wherever our explorations took us.

They say you should never go back, and it was difficult to see how anything could live up in cold reality to those glorious memories. But if I set off on my return visit to the Scilly Isles with a touch of trepidation, I left with my love of this magical place well and truly reaffirmed.

The Scilly Isles nestle in the Atlantic Ocean some 25 miles south west of Cornwall, warmed by the Gulf Stream to provide one of the mildest, most agreeable climates you will find in the UK. There are over 100 islands in the archipelago, but only a handful of them are inhabited by anything other than sea birds and Atlantic grey seals.

We stayed for most of our trip on Tresco, the second biggest of the Scilly Isles, but still blissfully quiet and unspoilt. It is a beautiful place, a mixture of the rugged seascapes and deserted golden beaches that grace so much of the islands, and the wonderful and surprising sub- tropical Tresco Abbey Gardens.

Established by Augustus Smith in 1834, the 17-acre gardens are an extraordinary collection of spectacular trees, plants and flowers from every corner of the world. Many of them would not survive in open cultivation anywhere else in the UK, but those warm Gulf Stream waters ensure that they can flourish here.

The base for our stay was the Island Hotel, a quiet and luxurious hotel with stunning views over Tresco’s calm, azure blue waters to the breakers crashing over Golden Ball Reef, in the mid-distance.

Our corner suite, with a colonial- style wooden balcony and 180- degree window views of the bay, was as close to Paradise for this sea-loving journalist as anywhere I have ever had the privilege to stay.

The staff are friendly and unobtrusive, the food in the restaurant locally sourced, fresh and delicious, with sea food, as you might expect, featuring strongly.

On Tresco, we also visited the Flying Boat Club, a new development of timeshare and rental cottages. Traditional in design, with wooden exteriors, they blend in well with the rest of the rustic homes scattered about the bay. They boast modern fittings, wonderful sea views, and access for residents to the club itself, a complex including a bar and restaurant, indoor swimming pool, gym and spa.

After two nights on Tresco, it was time to say farewell with a heavy heart and take the short boat hop to the neighbouring island of Bryher, one of the less populated, more rugged islands in the group.

Here we stayed at the Island Hotel’s sister property, the Hell Bay Hotel. Doesn’t sound promising, does it?

In fact, Hell Bay sits on Bryher’s west coast, looking out across the Atlantic Ocean, next stop, the USA. Mighty waves break against its craggy coastline, which enjoys majestic sunsets.

The hotel’s dining room and public rooms overlook this dramatic vista, and a much more tranquil inland lagoon. It is a fantastic setting against which to relax over a leisurely meal, or enjoy a drink after dinner.

The rooms are spacious and comfortable, and it has a relaxed and comfortable ambience, an ideal base from which to roam the island or just relax and unwind.