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With love from Cornwall (1991)

with love from Cornwall St Anthonys

20.5.91 Here in a lovely hotel for one week. Weather dull but went to lovely St Mawes & found sun. Most enjoyable Trust things are sorting out for you Love Auntie Vi

Another brief update from Auntie Vi, once again featuring the hotel and the weather – those stalwarts of British postcard writing!

Interestingly, Auntie Vi has written a date of 20.5.91 on the card, but the postmark can clearly be seen as ‘NEWQUAY 14 MAY 1991’ – that will remain a mystery…

1991 was a difficult year for us, and many others, as the UK was deep in recession, to which Auntie Vi makes reference in her message.

 

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With love from Denmark (1981)

with love from Denmark

Hello Hilary! I send you many greetings from the danish island Møn. I stay here with 5 friends. We rent a house very near to the sea and the beach. The weather has been very good for the whole week and I got very brown. I’ll soon write more. Yours Claudia

This card from Møn is postmarked ‘STEGE 14.30 8 8 1981’ and carries a 1 krone 30 stamp commemorating the oldest Danish coin.

Claudia is enjoying some good weather in Denmark; she sent this card to me not long after I’d arrived in Norway.

There are now many cards posted here from Claudia – she continues to communicate regularly although these days it is usually via WhatsApp 🙂

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With love from Algarve, Portugal (1986)

with love from Portugal

Dear Hilary & Simon, Weather lovely Having a good time I suffered losing a stone for my holiday I will put 25 stone on the food is fab Love Auntie Laura

A short and sweet note featuring our favourite topics of the weather and food!

The card is postmarked ’25-VI 1986 Armacao‘ and carries a selection of stamps, two of which are from the Traditional Portugal Architecture series and one from the Development of Technology series, issued in 1978

Auntie Laura was my great aunt, she was married to my Nan’s brother. We saw them regularly at family gatherings when I was young, and they were fun to be around. Auntie Laura was a rock within her own immediate family; she died some years ago.

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With love from Canary Islands (1982)

with-love-from-canary-islands

Dear Hilary, You will gather I’ve made it to the sun, well some sun, but also cloud, but it is warm.  The Island is beautiful – gorgeous flowers in profusion.  The Atlantic seems always to be in fury.  I tried to swim in it one day but the undercurrents were frightening so have stuck to the pool.  Hope all is well with you, love Auntie Joyce

What an evocative and descriptive status update from back in the day – the picture on the front confirms the colourful flowers and we can imagine the waves crashing to the shore!

Postmarked ’18 FEB 82 TENERIFE’ the card carries 20 pesetas of stamps featuring King Juan Carlos I from the 1976-84 definitive series.

It is unclear which of the Canary Islands Joyce is visiting, but the postmark suggests that it is Tenerife.

This is an earlier card from Auntie Joyce who appears to be holidaying alone on this occasion.  She has always loved cultivating flowers in her garden and is continually on the look out for new varieties.  I remember that Auntie Joyce was a strong swimmer; it seems that she was wise to stick to the pool.  About 6 months ago some of my family met Auntie Joyce with members of her family for a bit of a reunion and a saunter down memory lane – it was good to catch up 🙂

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With love from Costa Brava, Spain (1979)

with-love-from-spain

Dear Hiraly, we are in beautiful sunny Spain and having a great time. We’re staying in the place on the front of the postcard. I’ve put a dot & a cross where I think our villa is. It’s a bit hard to distinguish one from another at that distance but never mind! So far I haven’t had time to write postcards but I’ve got a headache at the moment which really throbs so I haven’t been swimming. Too much sun I expect! I’m convinced I’ve got sunstroke though! I’ve bought myself some snorkelling stuff (very cheap here) and we (me, Neil, Ally, Paula, our friends) went snorkelling off the rocks. It was great fun. We saw shoals of fish, black very spiky sea urchins which I so cleverly got stuck in her big toe despite wearing plastic sandals. Luckily we managed to get most of it out. Trust me. I’d better go there’s not much space left as you can see. Hope to see you at end of summer love Jackie xxx PS Neil saw an octopus. I’ve never got of the sea so fast.

Another card from Jackie with her distinctive method of writing all around the edge and back across the top! Despite feeling under the weather she’s managed to pack a lot of news and anecdotes into the space.  The cross she refers to is just visible to the right of the trunk and on the wooded area in the distance; the dot is just below it.

The postmark date is 16 06 1979 and the stamp is one of a set of three encouraging us all to save energy.

Porta de la Selva is featured on the front and still looks much the same although that tree might have gone now!

Jackie was seemingly quite a prolific card writer and enjoyed many holidays with her family.

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with love from Armaçāo de Pêra, Portugal (1986)

With love from Portugal

WED Sun very hot but a constant cool breeze – just right. Being very lazy this week but will try and be a bit more energetic next week and look around the area.  Love Jo & John

A brief status update that concentrates on the weather 🙂

Armaçāo de Pêra is in the Algarve region of Portugal, on the southern coast.

The clear postmark reads ’20H 26-VI-1986 ARMACAO DE PERA’ and the card carries stamps to the value of 37.50 escudos (the currency in use before the euro was introduced in 2002).

The 25.00 escudos stamp is from the Traditional Architecture series issued in 1985 and the other two are from the 1978 Instruments Working definitive series.

Another card from Jo & John; as well as being my Mum’s cousin, John was also cousin to Betty and Ted.  (Family trees are always much easier to understand in diagrams rather than words!)