Coronation Street star Tanisha Gorey has declared some of her castmates her ‘besties’ after they were seen ditching the UK together.

The actress is best known for playing Asha Alahan in the ITV soap, having made her debut back in 2009, and previously revealed how she had never taken an acting class before she first appeared, aged six.

But after years on the famous cobbles, Tanisha was seen taking a break. However, it wasn’t quite as it seemed as she was joined by her Corrie co-stars Andy Whyment and Dame Maureen Lipman, who Corrie fans will know as Kirk Sutherland and Evelyn Plummer.

The trio were seen ditching the UK for Malta as they took part in the new ITV programme The Great Escapers, with their episode airing on Sunday night (November 30).

The programme sees three famous faces from a number of ITV shows, including Corrie, Loose Women, and I’m A Celebrity jet off to Rhodes, Spain, Portugal and Malta together, where they have to compete to give their colleagues the best holiday experience they can.

During their trip, Tanisha, Maureen and Andy weren’t alone, as they were joined by Jet2holidays Customer Helper Gio, who was on hand to arrange experiences that would really make the trip memorable.

While Maureen took the group on an electric buggy tour of the Three Cities, complete with a dgħajsa – a traditional Maltese gondola-type boat trip across the Grand Harbour, Tanisha treated the group to a cookery class and a glass-blowing workshop.

Meanwhile, Andy, who is fond of hitting the high seas as a regular cruiser, was seen whisked the group away on a speed boat tour before an evening of karaoke – something else his co-stars as well as fans will know he’s quite partial to.

Amid the episode airing, Tanisha took to Instagram with a string of snaps from their trip and told their followers: “Postcards from Malta. I have soooo much love for these two.” She also shared a selfie of the trio to her Instagram Story and declared: “Besties!”

Andy was quick to respond to Tanisha post, as he shared in the comments section: “Absolutely loved our time in Malta.” Meanwhile, there fellow Corrie star Sydney Martin shared: “gorgeous gorgeous girl!” while Sally Carman-Duttine gushed: “LOVE THIS!”

Andy also shared his own holiday photo album from the trip to his own Instagram post, alongside which he wrote: “A few pictures from our shoot in Malta including our crew who were amazing. Me @tanisha.gorey and Dame Maureen had a fantastic time being Great Escapers and are really pleased with the episode.”