Whilst we love to travel overseas, the Isles of Scilly have always been on the list of places to explore. It has been nicknamed the Caribbean Cornwall and if you think white sands, beautiful aquamarine blue sea, quiet islands, lovely people, small boats and warm sunshine - well that's what it was this August.

It all began rather early in the morning with Ian, Karen and I heading down to Penzance to catch the Scillonian boat - often nicknamed the "Sickolian" due to the sea currents and swells. Luggage and car sorted, we boarded realising the crossing was predicted to be good. Phew! It was...

It was to be week of walking - in fact we walked 172,000 steps in the eight days - probably 85 miles in total. Every island, every corner and every cove demanded to be explored. We are still left with a list of places we ran out of time to see.

St. Mary's island was our base - the largest island with golden beaches, sailing boats and rowing boats, a buzzy town whenever the Scillonian was in, little boats on the quay waiting to take you to the islands, galleries and artists, great fish n chips and the invaluable and very, very busy Co op. We also discovered an interesting Bronze Age village and related sites.

In prehistoric times, the islands would have been joined by sand bars and more accessible to traverse. A very different vista.

Prime Minister Harold Wilson loved St. Mary's and is buried in the Old Town churchyard. In fact we also passed his bungalow every day as it was very close to where we were staying. The same churchyard has the vast majority of graves from a horrendous shipwreck which affected the islands greatly, many lost their lives. Well worth reading about if you have the time. 

St. Martin's island was also quite big and the thundery showers had us seeking shelter under a cricket pavilion, trees and bushes where possible. The downpours were sudden and large.The heather was superb everywhere, peeping through the bracken on every island. The bramble bushes were laden with blackberries along every sandy track and unspoilt pathway.

We spent a long time on one beach watching a group of eight seals messing about in the water. The sea was like an artists' palette of colours - clear, blue, aquamarine, turquoise waters.

Tresco is probably the island most people know about because of its' famous gardens and abbey. We chose to walk around this privately owned island instead. Its' unsignposted pathways through bracken, sand dunes, white sand beaches, over rocks and along small lanes was glorious. Unfortunately it was too windy to kayak around the outcrops off the beach.               

St. Agnes was such surprise as it was so different to the other islands. We have never seen such massive and beautiful rocks - it was like plonking Dartmoor onto the island.

 There were constant views across to Bishops Rock Lighthouse where "Twitchers" were desperately trying to spot the rare arrival of a red booby and a brown booby. The tide was low when we arrived on St Agnes so we were able to walk across the sand and pebbles to wander around the island of Gugh.

Bryher was an island I was keen to explore but unfortunately the boat departure times were delayed due to massive high and low tides as a result of the massive Blue Supermoon. We managed a short walk and it reminded me of Sark in the Channel Islands but smaller. Boats were beginning to moor up in order to go shrimping at low tide - an annual event which includes a gathering of people in the exposed channel of sand between Tresco and Bryher.

Our return home took place on a grey, drizzly day but the crossing was still good. What a great week for the three of us.