I still send most things via royal fail in my local post office. Knives, axes, etc are not banned by them; it's just that some monkey used a picture of a knife as a weapon on the literature of banned articles. As long as it is safely wrapped then there is no issue, but if the jobsworths want to know what is in it then tell them it's tools or something similarly vague. My local PO stopped asking me a long time ago (mostly because I got a sex toy out of the box to show them when the new enthusiastic staff member persisted her enquiries!).
I use parcels2go or similar when I have heavy or large items (like full sized axes) and end up with UPS or DPD normally