Three young Pembrokeshire philatelists have put the stamp of approval on their recent exciting meeting with royalty.

The trio, who all attend Haverfordwest High School, were invited to London to meet Her Majesty the Queen at the opening of the Royal Philatelic Society London's new premises. Carys Llewellyn, aged 15; Filip Middlemist, aged 13 and Toby Middlemist, aged 11 were amongst just five young stamp collectors chosen to attend the event.

Said Toby: "Meeting the Queen was an incredible experience, just incredible; she has the most valuable stamp collection in the world".

He added: "I made friends with one of the other young collectors who is my age and we are going to be penfriends - he has just moved from London to Paris."

Filip said: "It just shows that if you put effort into anything it can go anywhere. I would never have thought my stamp collecting would end up with me meeting the Queen."

And Carys commented: "It was a wonderful experience and I felt very lucky to be invited. I felt honoured to be there representing other young stamp collectors".

The junior collectors were shown round the impressive premises as well as being introduced to many prominent people in the stamp collecting world who were keen to speak to them.

Pembrokeshire has many young collectors, as it is the home of the award-winning Stamps in Schools project which was founded by retired teacher Erene Grieve.

Mrs Grieve has been operating the project for over 20 years and is sponsored by the British Postal Museum and has the support of members the Haverfordwest Philatelic and Postcard Club.

The club is well-known for its involvement with youth philately and many stamp clubs have been set up in schools over the life time of the project, in Pembrokeshire and throughout the UK.

For more information about Stamps in Schools email erenegrieve@gmail.com