Just spotted a few thoughts by Matthew Parris of The Times on the Isles of Scilly. Bryher, the island on which I spent ten summers, is no bigger than a mile one way, a mile and a half the other, with a population of less than 100, but that little piece of Atlantic-beaten land, with its hidden beaches, expansive views and rocky outcrops, from the soft sands of Rushy Bay to steep drops of Hell Bay, is like nowhere else I've been. I haven't returned for nearly another ten summers, afraid the age of tourism might have spoilt its wildness, but perhaps it's weathered the storm...
'When first I visited, some years ago, the Isles of Scilly were, for me, the most unexpected place. I had thought “tame”. They are wild. I’d thought “manicured”. They are unkempt. I’d thought “herbaceous borders”. They are rock-strewn moor and grassland. I’d thought “cream teas and sightseeing tours on the hour”. Instead, heaving seas and occasional inter-island ferries with wooden seats.
This August, on a two-day break for my 60th birthday, I had thought “crowded beaches in August”. But the empty white sand beaches and clear water bays were almost lonely: a magical sojourn on the island of Bryher, cut off from transport and the holiday crowds, and with a desperate scramble to find a boat to the next island on the morning we had to leave.
Little more, really, than a slew of ragged granite outcroppings flung out into the ocean off the end of Cornwall; the fingers of rock and steep little fields didn’t swim into view from the haze on the Atlantic horizon until just after we’d lost sight of Land’s End. Somehow that matters.'
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