ARMCHAIR TRAVELLER
So near and yet so far
Geordie Greig catches an unexpected shag in the idyllic Scilly Isles The perfect shag. She was wild and alluringly beautiful. She was alone and seemingly unattached, and was certainly not going to hang around. It had all been so quick. She left barely before I had time to gasp more than a murmur of my appreciation. Afterwards, I felt a compulsion to tell my wife who was 5,000 miles away in India on business about this irresistible force of nature that I had experienced while I was on my own in the Isles of Scilly. Well, not exactly on my own: I was with our three young children. And also, of course, with my wild, wonderful and totally unexpected shag. The children had witnessed it too. They had been as excited as I was. You must tell Mummy, they shrieked. Shhh, I said, as by then they were really shouting. I didn’t want them to share this private moment of natural passion quite so volubly with the world at large. It had seemed rather an intimate few seconds. But then everything changed and it became exceedingly public. The captain of the Firethorn of Bryher, our island ferry, boomed out on a loudspeaker the news that what everyone thought was a shag, in fact was a cormorant. Both are black and beautiful and apparently are often and easily muddled. Sorry, guys, I fessed to the children, I got the wrong bird. Silly Daddy, said my six-yearold twins in unison. No, just in Scilly, was my lame riposte.
What was beyond doubt to all of us was that these islands off the coast of Cornwall are truly beautiful. Untouched, wild coastline with perfect white sandy beaches. Hill walks among wild flowers as colourful and exotic as it gets with white harebells and anemones, and all unpolluted by modern agricultural pest control. In Scilly it seems as if time has stood still since the 1950s. No cars. Bicycles and front doors left unlocked. A small village store. Enid Blyton-like innocence blended with Swallows and Amazons-like adventures which are tailormade for young families. Crabbing, sealspotting, bird-twitching, exotic palm-treed gardens, walks across Bronze Age settlements — everyone entirely reliant on the wind and the wave for all arrivals and departures. Scilly is one of the last untouched landscapes in Britain — wild, wilful and wondrous. Tresco, the second biggest island, is where Princess Diana and the princes came on secret, unreported holidays. Jude Law, and recently Brad and Angelina came and left before anyone could even say the word paparazzi. And, of course, it is where to look for the perfect wild shag as well as puffins. There are 46 islands and there is a sort of inverse snobbery with the wilder and more remote. Frequent boasts over kipper breakfasts go along the line of we saw no other person over a three-hour walk or we spotted the peregrine falcon seize a fish in mid-air. What makes this so remarkable is that these islands are so close (just an hour’s flight from Bristol on a Biggles-like De Havilland taking just 18 passengers) and yet so far in feel from the mainland. Forget Tesco’s, the local joke is that the best shopping is at Tresco’s, a one-stop local store on Tresco — the only private island — owned by the Duchy of Cornwall but leased to the DorienSmith family who essentially run and own everything from the bicycle hire shop to the New Inn. Nothing jars with the idyllic, Fifties time-warp feel. No Sky dishes in sight, and certainly no high-street brands or logos. All rubbish is recycled in bins enclosed in wood casings so nothing unsightly is visible. It is like being in a private fiefdom but one where the community and landlordproprietor have worked out a mutually beneficial balance of power. Robert DorienSmith dips into his own pocket to top up the shortfall of funds from government for the island school. The islands’ cut-flower industry may have crumpled, yet tourism is booming. Modern intrusion is avoided, yet this is no Luddite backwater. Wireless reception is available at the excellent Tresco Island Hotel as is a chef who would give any top London restaurant a run for his money. Flash does not exist. For instance, a tractor with a trailer meets hotel guests off the stone pier. Its sister hotel, Hell Bay, is cool modern within Bronze Age rugged terrain. Crashing waves, white beaches, perfect service. It is exactly where Agatha Christie would have a murder mystery unfold. Very very English, rather polite and restrained but with a sense of wildness as palpable and beautiful as ... as the perfect shag.
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