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Top tip One reader has had success with a tip by Nancy Birtwhisle (left)

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Green clean

I was thrilled to see your article about Nancy Birtwhistle and her green living campaign (January). I wasn’t a Bake Off watcher when she won and so I hadn’t heard of her – until she appeared in my Instagram feed.

I had already been getting more interested in green cleaning products, so after watching some of her reels and trying out the tips, I bought the book. One of the more odd-sounding ideas was laundry liquid from conkers, but it happened to be conker season, so I gave it a try. Guess what? It works! I had already converted to Ecover liquid, but it’s jolly expensive, so now I dilute it half and half with conker liquid; using that together with washing soda and Nancy’s vinegar-based conditioner, my laundry and washing machine are sparkling. Highly recommended. At last, something good comes out of social media.

Priscilla Heaton, London

Isle of plenty

I was interested to read Mark Palmer’s column in the March edition. As a child, I too holidayed most years with my parents in Seaview. I remember the Orange Tree well.

While I have welcomed being able to travel further, I feel many people think they haven’t had a holiday unless it’s overseas. This country has a lot to offer, including the Isle of Wight, although, of course, the sun is never guaranteed and with our problems in the UK with water pollution, perhaps Mauritius is a more certain bet.

But the UK should not be looked down upon. Indeed, ‘Why not go to the Isle of Wight instead?’ I loved it so much I ended up living in Seaview for a while and still live on the island. I feel fortunate to be living in such a beautiful place, generally with better weather than much of the rest of the UK. Mark’s fellow columnist Hunter Davies has an abode on the island, and I am sure he would agree!

Janet Weston Cowes, Isle of Wight

Holidays on home turf

Growing up in the 1940s and 1950s, I never had a holiday with my parents. Dad was a small-scale milk producer/ retailer, assisted by Mum. They could not take time off together, as the half-dozen cows had to be milked and the milk delivered around our village. The solution was railway ‘Runabout Tickets’. For 30 shillings, passengers had unlimited travel for a week over a certain area. During one week of each summer holiday, I had days out by steam train with Mum, then on another week, I’d travel with Dad.

Our usual destinations were Bournemouth, Swanage or Weymouth. My favourite days were taking a paddle steamer from Bournemouth to Swanage, returning via the Swanage-Wareham branch line with its push me, pull you tank engines. As a youngster, I never expected to travel overseas, much less spend six weeks touring New Zealand in my seventies, one of many wonderful holidays in later life.