Year in review 2025: Stories to make you smile

Escaped, honey-hungry bears, an emotional reunion and a round egg.

We have selected six stories to make you smile that made the news in Devon and Cornwall in 2025.

Two bears briefly escaped their enclosure at Wildwood Devon in June and ventured into a food store where they ate a week's supply of honey.

European brown bears Mish and Lucy sparked a "code red" and led to 16 people, including children, being locked in a play barn for their safety.

Dubbed the "Great Honey Heist", the getaway came about after a gate was left unlocked.

The duo also snaffled jam and other supplies, prompting a "sugar rush" that led to them charging around and climbing up trees before they "crashed out" and fell into a deep sleep for several hours.

The park, near Exeter, later received generous donations of honey from the local community.

In April, a festival on a sandbar brought 90 minutes of merriment to hundreds of people in the Isles of Scilly.

The Low Tide Event took place in the channel between Tresco and Bryher, which is usually under 20ft (6m) of water, when the sea level subsided.

Tom Matthews, co-organiser, told BBC Radio Cornwall: "If you can, imagine a few hundred people gathering in the middle of the sea.

"We do have a klaxon because we have to say at some point, 'You really do need to go now'."

A man who was seriously injured while paddleboarding in north Devon was reunited with the 14-year-old boy who saved his life.

Oscar paddled to help Gavin Bowden, 60, after he was hit on the head by his board in heavy surf at Saunton Sands in April.

The junior member of Saunton Sands Surf Life Saving Club worked alone to pull Mr Bowden on to his board, signalled to the shore and kept him afloat for 30 minutes until help arrived.

After Mr Bowden left hospital he was reunited with Oscar who he called "my little hero".

Actor James Norton said he "didn't want to leave" Cornwall after the filming of TV drama Playing Nice ended.

He credited the community around Newquay for not only welcoming the crew so warmly but for helping him learn a Cornish accent for the drama's lead character.

Cornish filming locations for the series included Watergate Bay, Mevagissey, the Jubilee Pool in Penzance, Minions, Newlyn East and stretches of the north Cornwall coast.

Norton, a Yorkshireman, said he had found the county to be "a jewel, it's the most beautiful part of the whole country".

A woman discovered what she claimed to be a "one-in-a-billion" egg due to its unusual round shape.

Alison Greene, an egg handler on Fenton Farm, near the Somerset border, identified the rarity just before last Christmas.

A similar discovery sold at auction for £200 in Berkshire with the funds going a mental health charity.

A gull took revenge on a man who was installing anti-bird spikes in a Cornish town - by drinking his coffee and pinching his mug.

Maintenance worker Darren Pardoe had been bird proofing houses in Porthleven when he stopped at a pub for a coffee in June.

He found the gull helping himself to the hot brew and before he could take action, the feathered thief flew off with the mug.

"I think it had remembered me," he joked.

Follow BBC Cornwall on X, Facebook and Instagram. Follow BBC Devon on X, Facebook and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected].