Finchingfield man’s postcard arrives 28 years late

A postcard a man sent to his parents while on holiday arrived through the letterbox 28 years after it was posted.

Jim Green, 66, went to Benidorm, Spain, in September 1991 with friends when he sent the card back home to Essex.

He assumed it got lost in the post when his parents never received it at their Finchingfield address.

The painter and decorator said he “couldn’t believe it” when the postcard landed on the doormat, as first reported in the Dunmow Broadcast.

Mr Green, who lives in his parents’ house with his brother, said: “I’m amazed that it could be held up for such a long time.”

Royal Mail said it was “difficult to speculate what may have happened to this item of mail”.

It said it was likely the postcard was put back into the postal system by someone recently “rather than it being lost or stuck somewhere”.

The card, dated 12 September 1991, reads: “To Mum and Dad. Had a good flight over. Everything’s OK. Good hotel, weather etc. Weather has been very hot. Hope cats are OK. Must close now, love Jim.”

Mr Green, whose parents have since died, said the two-week holiday did not turn out as well as the postcard hoped.

“Our hotel room was on one of the higher floors and for quite a few days we weren’t getting any hot water. I went down and got bottled water and had to wash with that.

“Then to top it off, we went down the road and had strawberries and cream and we all got tummy bugs,” he said.

But, he said, the “weather was great and the food was OK”.

The postcard, which arrived on Thursday, has been placed on the mantle piece next to a Victorian clock owned by Mr Green’s grandfather.