Win flowers from the Isles of Scilly

Why do you send Scilly flowers?

In our winter newsletter we invited you to tell us why you started sending flowers with us. We had some great responses and we have now chosen our favourite five tales and sent the winners each a box of scented narcissi to brighten up January. Very kindly all the winners agreed that we could share their entries, you can enjoy them below. 

 The winners

Claudia Holzgartner Warwickshire

Jackie May Cornwall 

Fiona and Tim Jones Surrey

Sarah Lucas Suffolk

Elizabeth Leverton Derbyshire

Claudia - I started sending Scilly Flowers because I have very fond memories of going on holiday with my parents, I think it was 1994, I would have been 11 years old. It was an exciting holiday as we flew into the islands by helicopter from Penzance. I’d never been in one before so found it really exciting. We stayed in a lovely hotel on St Martins island. One day the hotel organised for us to go to a desert island for the day with a special hamper they had prepared, we travelled by a little boat and spent the day there exploring a tiny island that only had one tiny stone hut on it. It got more interesting as the sun started to go down, my parents started looking at their watches discussing what time the hotel said they’d be picking us up. Anyway long story short they completely forgot to pick us up! My mum (on my dad’s orders!) told my mum to wade out a little to get the attention of passing boat (neither could swim!) Luckily she managed as it helped we had made a fire on the beach with drift wood to get some attention of someone!! My dad smoked at the time so he had a lighter handy!

Anyway we got back to the hotel eventually a lot later than planned. They said we could have a free evening meal because of what had happened, when we went into the dining room it was quite busy & I remember everyone clapping as we walked in through the doors. Being 11 years old I was seriously embarrassed but we always talked about it years later. My mum even framed this photo of our fire on the little island!

I’ve been ordering flowers from you for a long time now, always sending them to my mum on her birthday and mother’s days. The narcissisi always make me think of our adventures there & of course the delightful smell of spring too.

Sarah - . A friend once sent me about ten boxes. No note so I didn’t know who sent them. He was drunk doing it and must have clicked the button too many times. I had to put them in Buckets! The smell was wonderful. That’s where it all started for me.

Fiona & Tim - You said that you would like to hear from anyone who thought that they may have been with you since near the beginning – and we have! We first visited Scilly for our honeymoon, at the start of July 1991. We stayed at Churchtown Farm Cottage, arriving a day later than our booking because gales meant that the Scillonian was not sailing as planned. In those days, with no internet and no mobile phones, we had to go to the quayside at Penzance in order to find out that the ferry was not sailing. We spent a delightful week in the cottage, then booked ourselves into the farmhouse for one night’s B&B. That evening was spent in the farmhouse kitchen with Hilary & Andrew and Keith the fisherman who arrived with a bucket of prawns. These were enjoyed with beans on toast and rather a lot of sherry. During the evening, we had a conversation about whether sending narcissi by post from St Martins might be viable. This was the beginning of your fabulous flower boxes. There were two or three gorgeous puppies on the farm, black and white, one was called Daffodil. The final night of our honeymoon was spent at the St Martins Hotel, as it was called then. Keith arranged for us to be upgraded to the honeymoon suite – lovely of him as we had booked a basic room. We have returned to the islands many times, including for our Silver Wedding Anniversary which we spent back at Churchtown Farm Cottage. It has been wonderful to see how the flower farm, and the Julian family with it, have developed over the years.

Jackie - We started sending them to my mum at first as she was convinced the old helicopter service, flew over her house all day everyday and she she always convinced they were flying flowers over, so we started sending them to her. So on special days would look out even more for helicopters, sadly she has just passed but they still fly over where she is resting, but we still get her daffodils from you. (We never told her they probably come on the boat!)