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We can help you book your perfect break to Tresco. We all live here, so it's our specialist subject!

Call us on +44 (0)1720 422 849 or email us.

By Helicopter - Direct to Tresco

By Helicopter - Direct to Tresco

Fly direct to Tresco with Penzance Helicopters - making the flight to the Isles of Scilly as memorable as the destination

Before you Arrive

Before you Arrive

Our pre-arrival checklist - from letting us know your travel plans to ordering your wine and groceries

Tresco Islandshare

Tresco Islandshare

Own a piece of this unique island, with 40 years of holidays on Tresco as more than just a visitor. Discover Islandshares for sale...

Tresco Offers & Breaks

Tresco Offers & Breaks

From seasonal escapes to wellness and creative breaks and last-minute offers, discover our latest offers & breaks on Tresco Island

Eating

Eating

From beachfront dining to our cosy inn, get a taste for island-inspired dining with a Tresco twist

Grocery

Grocery

Place a pre-arrival grocery order and we'll deliver to your accommodation on your arrival

Events & Experiences

Events & Experiences

From the Low Tide Event to live music, Abbey Garden Theatre and more, discover extraordinary events on the Isles of Scilly

Day Trips to Tresco

Day Trips to Tresco

Whether you're coming from elsewhere on Scilly, or further afield in Devon or Cornwall, a day trip to Tresco is the perfect day out

MyTresco - Richard Mellor

Richard Mellor has a pretty enviable life, jetting off around the world as a freelance travel journalist for publications including The Guardian, The Times, Metro and Lonely Planet. One place had, until recently, eluded him: Tresco. Here he shares his first and enduring impressions of the island…

As our eight-person light aircraft whirrs over the Atlantic, me and my fellow neck-craning passengers are competing in an unspoken (but definite) game of ‘Spot the Scilly’.

There’s sea, there’s sea, there’s sea and then – yes! I saw it first! – suddenly there are the Isles, abundant and sleek like some sort of epic whale pod.

“First time visiting Scilly?” asks Dave the skipper, after I’ve hopped aboard a tiny boat bound for Tresco. “You’ll be gutted to leave,” he promises when I nod.

It’s already obvious why. For here, as Dave plots a careful course around undersea rocks with murderous intent, is that fabled Isles of Scilly seascape: see-through water the colour of emeralds, yellow-tinged coral, kelpy reaches and long strands of sugar-white sand. A blazing sun also helps. “Cor,” I whisper, a bit light-headed.

So far I’ve resolutely resisted any clichéd “this could be the Caribbean”-type outbursts. But the arrival at Tresco’s jetty of islander Tom in a golf buggy clinches it. This really could be the Caribbean. But in fact it’s Grimsby – or rather New Grimsby, Tresco’s unofficial village ‘capital’. Tom, my bag and I traverse the car-free isle’s spine, a shallow hill, and chug past a churchyard into Old Grimsby, and my luxurious apartment. And so begin two terrific days.

What I ultimately love most about Tresco is the ease of escape. Yes, the twin Grimsbys get faintly chokka, with a little bike and buggy traffic along leafy lanes and regular pier-side bustle. Nor, understandably, are the nearby Tresco Abbey’s glorious subtropical gardens deserted – though their size makes finding seclusion simple, and I have a nut-stashing red squirrel all to myself.

Yet walk north across gorgeous moorland to what’s left of King Charles’s Castle, or pedal south along the dune-ridden coast path, and you barely see a soul. Bar a passing buzzard, I have Pentle Bay – one of Britain’s great beaches – completely to myself on a balmy Friday afternoon in May. Bonkers.

Also brilliant is the low-key way that we tourists are treated. There’s never a sense of being an outsider, and no sinister stares or sudden silence as I enter The New Inn. But neither is the friendliness excessive. I’m simply permitted to fit in, to be.

At the Ruin Beach Café, gazing out to sea and vaguely hoping to spot a dolphin, my wonderful languor is tempered only by the pestering memory of some ghastly place called London, where I’m due to be tomorrow. But then my Tresco Beef ragu and pappardelle arrives, and I forget all about it.

Richard Mellor is a freelance travel writer for publications including The Guardian, The Times, Metro and Lonely Planet.

Stay on Tresco

Winter and Festive breaks are not always available to book online - for cottage stays or New Inn breaks over the winter months please go to Winter on Tresco or call 01720 422849.

Or call +44 (0)1720 422 849