We find deciding the next trail to walk is becoming increasingly difficult. The overwhelm induced by the amount of choice makes it hard to focus on one plan and go with it. There are SO many places I want to go.
I can’t remember what it was that drew me to this one last Christmas- naturally bringing best mate Flat Eric along has a big influence on the trails assessable to us. We’ve never been to the Channel Islands. I like islands. There are five of them which meant boats. I like boats. It felt like a good compromise of feeling further away and marginally more exotic than home, but still being relatively close too. Does that sound like good rational?
The Channel Islands Way (which will now be noted as CIW – and pronounced seeeiww) is 113 miles / 182km approximately around the five islands.
For no particular reason, other than that being the order in which I booked the ferries, we’re going biggest to smallest. Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark, Herm.
The logistics around ferry booking was too much from me to try and work out in a big picture fashion, so rather than investigating all possibilities and schedules to ensure the dates and times lined up like maybe I should have, instead I just started at the start and booked my way through hoping it would line up with EXACTLY what we needed.
We left home early morning in early August and drove the 90 minutes to Portsmouth Ferry terminal. Specifically the car loading spot, which I had to quickly and illegally reverse out from (while Snakes shouted at me while shaking with fear at how illegal it was) before scooping across multiple ‘no entry’ lanes and into the poorly signed foot passenger drop off area.
I chucked out all the cargo and Snakes and Flat Eric drove the 6 minutes to someone’s pre-booked driveway where the car would wait for the next two weeks. She romped the mile or so back to me at the terminal ensuring Eric did a poop on route.
Having swiftly checked in, in the nearly empty terminal, we sat out in the warming morning and waited a short while for a lovely woman to come and collect Eric, who had to be escorted around the side of the building while we went through it having our bags and ourselves properly security checked. So if you need to take drugs, guns or knives to Jersey, hide them in your dog.
Once on board the ferry we checked into our two birth cabin which came complete with shower and toilet, tv, towels, beds and bedding. There is a cheaper pet lounge where you’ll find a pre-reserved table with your name on it, but these spaces were fully booked; and when I learned that the Portsmouth ferry was a whopping 10 hours, I was glad of the luxury.
We went to get a coffee and explored the ship, introduced Eric to the ‘pet toilet’ which looked like a scruffy broken section of a crazy golf course and was certainly not something Eric was ever going to urinate on.
Back to the cabin for a well earned nap.
There is a 4.5 hour ferry from Poole which is a slightly shorter drive from our house and very similarly priced to the Portsmouth one, but dogs have to be crated and left in a cargo bay in the bowls of the ship. Naturally this was absolutely out of the question. Not because we would have to bring a crate, because, frustratingly we had to do that anyway for a ferry later in the week for Guernsey, but because Eric to perfect to be referred to as cargo.
We spent the 10 hours in perfect peace with a little anxiety over Eric not weeing thrown in. The DFDS boat staff could (probably) not have been friendlier or more helpful. It’s was warm, calm quiet and not far from empty.
We’ve bought with us Eric’s massive crate for this one ferry crossing and hope to leave it somewhere in Jersey while we walk around the island, before utilising it on this 1hr crossing where we’ll have to find somewhere to leave it again on Guernsey until the end of our trip. Fun logistics no? I emailed a pet shop ahead of time who were happy to have it, but closed at 5:30pm while we arrived at 7:30 so the plan was just to walk about St Helier on arrival and ask people while wafting a tenner in their face.
This turned out to be unnecessary as on arrival in Jersey at 7:20pm Snakes asked the first lanyard wearing man if we could leave our crate at the harbour. He said we could. So we did. And I saved £1 of the tenner on account of it being £9 for the three days.
Eric yanked me off in all directions desperate for a pee as she refused to go on the ship, she pulled me for a good long while as we entered and exited indoor spaces trying to get out of the labyrinth that was the terminal of the harbour, eventually, long after it was due she did the biggest wee on the first and tiniest patch of grass we came to. Phew.
We walked the streets of St Helier, heading for the coast and the esplanade. It was half an hour before we came across the first kiosk / beach cafe and naturally we pulled in there as we needed some fodder before walking off into the night.
The sun was setting on the beach and it was gloriously warm.
After a good and expensive feed we set off once again into the dimming light. The town was bustling and full of late night runners (who the hell runs at 9:30pm on a Monday ? Why haven’t you eaten yet? ) the promenade was dimly lit with green festoons and it was a really nice few miles out of town along the shores peering into the windows of the swanky pants houses overlooking the beach. We soon came to St Aubin a arm off St Helier we must have looked very incongruous with the very sweet smelling families on holiday, out for dinner, strolling back to their rentals and apartments as we, in full hiking gear, sauntered sweatily through this Monte Carlo esque Main Street.
Before long the street lights became fewer , the bars and restaurants turned to residential homes, the light became less and we were soon winding up a steep road out of town and into complete rural darkness. Once we summited our hill we followed country lanes out of town penned in by steep sided and very narrow stone walls. There was no wind and the air was thick.
Having used the power of maps, I knew after 5.7 miles out of the capital we would be in woodland. It was 10:30pm and after a time poking up and down less obvious side trails we eventually found a clearing in the woods with a nice open bracken and bramble-less space and not too many dead branches above our heads for me to loose sleep over. Perfect.
We set up camp in a thrice and were asleep immediately.
5.7 miles
Day 2 – Jersey
We woke before 6 and made everything look like we’d never been there before. Very out of character for us, we made a coffee and ate flapjacks before setting off, which we did prior to the arrival of 7am.
We ambled along windy dusty single track through the woodland and past the ancient burial tomb that I was happy not to have known last night that we were camping next to.
It wasn’t long before we saw our first big fat gun tower and military bunker show.
After Britain decided not to defend the Channel Islands during the Second World War German forces arrived in June 1940 and quickly took control, turning the islands into a heavily fortified part of Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. Islanders had to live under strict German rule, with food shortages, curfews, censorship and restrictions on everyday life. Thousands of forced and slave labourers were brought to the islands to build bunkers, tunnels and gun emplacements. After the war (which never came to the islands themselves) they left behind many of the fortifications (which we would repeatedly walk by).
The occupation ended on 9 May 1945, when German forces surrendered and the islands were liberated by British troops — just one day after VE Day.
The south and west coast today was to be LITTERED with ex-military paraphernalia. Guns, batteries, castles, ammunition bunkers YOU JUST NAME IT. It was mostly just concrete nicely disguised within the rock and the odd rusty metal door that my parents would have loved to have taken a photo of and stored it in their ‘rusty door’ photo album.
We meandered the cliff tops and steeply descended through a rocky outcrop reminiscent of New Mexico, onto a bloody sensual beach. Eric LOVES beaches. The only thing he loves more than a beach is a ball, a ball on a beach is just about the greatest joy that can happen to him. Yesterday evening while walking the beach, a group of lads gifted a ball to him.
We took a pause by the excellent toilets after a couple of miles walking before setting off once again, but not before seeing if Jersey churches also provide taps to the thirsty pilgrim- they do!
Fully loaded we upped and overed another headland steeply before swanning along over the tops. One of my top things is to have a good foot scrunching sound underfoot- so far this trail has been class for this very specific type of audio which I happen to love. Excellent foot scrunching.
The colours were magic and if felt arid like the desert but with an excellent and extremely distantly stretching sea view.
Having agreed everything here is too expensive to continually stop at every kiosk and cafe we pass, we stopped for a coffee and some toast at the first cafe we passed. Eric inhaled a sausage.
Onward now and still ambling over the tops while we oooo’d and ahhhh’d at the fortifications becoming slowly normalised the more we see them. We descended onto a massive beach and walked this for what felt like MILES, it was actually miles, but probably only 3 of them.
Part way we stopped at a very compelling exhibition on the sea.
We powered on up the beach and took it in turns to walk the sea defence or the sand, the sea defence was easier walking on the concrete tops but Flat Eric was only fully satisfied when one of us walked the sand with him.
We paused for lunch at the military museum and topped up using a cafe tap which we presumed was drinking water. All three of us fell asleep after a slap up feed of cheese, tomato and spring onion focaccia. Eric had a lunch tray of Burger King equivalence.
For this trip we’ve bough Eric some new gear- usually we pack out a towel, sleeping bag, mat AND a coat, but seeing as it’s never cold anymore in addition to her usual mat for comfort, (which is a Thermarest Z-Lite Sol cut down to Eric sized proportions) she also has a brand new jersey which, when soaked and ringed out keeps her cool. Though we can’t ask her so don’t know if it’s working.
It was heating up now and we set out into the exposed dunescape for a few miles before rounding the north west corner of the island in which we climbed back up onto the cliffs. Here the scenery changed somewhat dramatically and it became bracken, bramble, bumble bee and butterflies, much like the coastal path in Cornwall. Now we were mainly on cliff tops. The housing, which had been fairly sparse already, became more so.
Before too long we dropped into a cove and managed to make our noodle / potato special for dinner while enjoying a wine at the pub. I charged my phone and we topped up on water.
We hiked up and out of here on the road, clouds overhead looked threatening, we skirted around the firing range and took a path back to trail, on which I noticed the corners of a corn field hadn’t been planted, corners which were just larger than the size of our tent…. So we left the path and walked to the furthest corner of said field of corn and set up camp out of view.
Snakes is a new woman, let me tell you, she barely flinched at the thought of setting up camp in a farmers field, a suggestion that months back would have given her a twitch. The cause ? I think it’s her new big important job, in which she’s better off not taking any shit from anyone, and seems to have taken this into her home life, much to the delight of me (but only really when while wild camping).
The one short lived reservation was when she enquired if the farmer might be out at 5:45AM checking his corn. I assured her he wouldn’t and that was the end of that.
17 miles
Day 3 – Jersey
I can count the number of nights I’ve not woken up through the night on one hand and 2 additional fingers (thats 7 times) last night was one of them. The gentle russel of corn on corn and distant lapping waves was unbelievably relaxing. We woke to the same beautiful view we’d gone to sleep to, which was expected.
Eric was up and atam’ raring to go. We packed up and walked 100m to a bench which overlooked the end of the world. Here we drunk coffee and enjoyed the cool breeze before setting off.
Today would be the more challenging day on the coastal path, beautiful too. The trail was rarely flat but either up or down and rarely either for very long. This to me is the hardest kind of hiking. Before your body, before your muscles can get into any kind of flow, you’re almost immediately changing gradient and using different ones. It was hot and exposed a lot of the time, which meant great views but sweaty work. We repeatedly soaked Eric’s coat to keep her cool and she drinks when I do.
Like much of the south west coast path, these (likely) ancient trails send you utterly pointlessly down the hill you’ve just spent hard won breath climbing up, only to bloody well send you all the way back down again. This becomes fairly infuriating at times, to the point where when rounding a corner to find another infuriating descent I heard Snakes remark “this is pathetic!”. I’ve since been referring to all hills as pathetic.
We veered off trail mid morning and took country lanes inland by about a mile or so. The houses became extremely French looking, with a plethora of architectural designs and materials and gaudy hanging baskets and with a classic French desolate emptiness that makes you wonder on the type of person who lives there.
After sauntering down these empty lanes, it was incongruous to then turn into an industrial estate of business units and ‘Animal Kingdom’ the store that had been the reason for the diversion. There have been zero shops so far on this route, plenty of cafes, bars and kiosks, but Eric cannot live on pork sausages, though undoubtedly she’d like to try. This was an almighty pet shop, from which we purchased her a couple of meals and a ‘lunch’ to see her through until the end.
We made quick time of heading back to trail at Bonn Nuit bay where we descended the largest hill in the world, beyond the depths we needed to, to get to the cafe. Naturally we were only stopping for coffee but obviously we also had beans and toast as well. The table next to us consisted of an elderly couple who lived up the road and came to this cafe EVERY DAY (except Sunday) for breakfast, they used to own poodles, fell in love with Eric, and fed her bacon; because of this Eric completely ignored her expensive rabbit infused bore chew we’d got her from the pet shop.
We left off, up the hill and proceeded to undulate around the headlands for many miles. The heather was blooming and the sun made for Caribbean views down into the bays.
We made it to Rozel by lunch, which was close to the end of our days required mileage. Eric dragged us onto the almost empty beach and went straight for a brave ankle high dip in the sea.
We sat to have lunch and almost immediately and extremely officious woman came to tell us “they could lose their tourist status”. Now I, like you, hadn’t a clue what she was talking about and when I replied with a polite “sorry?” She merely repeated the statement but this time looked angrily at little Eric who was stood staring out to sea. I asked if she was suggesting that dogs were supposed to be on leads on the beach – to which she angrily responded “YES”. Snakes asked “what do you mean about tourist status though?” She aggressively said “read a book” then stormed off. New ‘takes no shit’ Snakes called her something I wont repeat.
After this surprising interaction I went to investigate and there was no signage about dogs whatsoever. But having asked some locals it’s generally an accepted island wide rule, the ignoring of which is slo generally accepted.
We went for a swim and had a nice freshwater shower on the beach to rinse off her negative energy.
We went for a pint at the Rozel pub who’s bartender laid out one of every kind of treat from her treat jar on the floor in front of Eric so he could chose which one he wanted. Naturally after pretending he was fussy initially, he ate all of them.
From here we had no particular plan and would just walk out until somewhere suitable to camp turned up. Even after spending a lengthy amount of time in Rozel it was still early. This next bit of walking saw us round the last headland of the north coast and turn south where immediately the whole coastline changed once again. Suddenly we were in a Pacific Ocean style wild rocky shoreline with barnacle encrusted rocks, rock pools and seaweed, with only spits and spats of sandy bays to venture out to the sea on. The walking became much easier and we motored along the path which sat just above high tide line and saw us quickly making more miles than we’d expected. We made it to my planned breakfast spot of the following morning, the cafe here was closed but the nice chef let us top up our water. We made dinner outside the bar then walked out to the nearby fort to enjoy our usual ramen noodles with mashed potato.
On the map I thought I found a spot a mile on which would work for a camp- another fort on top of a hill. We hiked up to it and it would have been fine save for it being only 7:30pm and us having not a lot to do before 10:00pm when it would be appropriate to set up camp. We decided to move on to the campsite which was 10 minutes up the road. We were now only 8 miles from St Helier and didn’t need to catch the boat until 7pm the following day, camping at Bay View would mean we could have the lie in (which we can’t really have while wild camping) and also, as it transpired a glass of wine too.
We purchased a hire towel and some soap and indulged in a shower, set up camp at this old boys home (not the home of an old man, a building which previously was home to boys), it was a peaceful and friendly campsite full of a mix of English and French, we slept very soundly.
Day 4 – Jersey > Guernsey
We woke early as usual but the campsite afforded us a nice doze until 7:30 when the tent started to warm.
Snakes showered again and we made tea and ate our flapjacks at a leisurely pace before packing up and heading back to the coast at 9:30.
Eric lunged all the way there and demanded her ball as soon as we were on the beach. It’s was a swift 5 or so mile stretch of hard packed sand, turquoise ocean and plenty of other dogs for Eric to show zero interest in.
I’ve been surprised as how empty Jersey is, August is the busiest month and of all the islands it’s supposed to be the most populated. For the most part we’ve had beaches to ourselves, never had to queue for anything and absolutely never felt like anywhere was too crowded.
We stopped at an empty kiosk and I swam with Eric while Snakes ordered us a couple of baps and iced coffee. This was exactly what I ordered.
We set off once again with the towering complex of St Helier in the distance, mostly it was beach walking, mostly flat and mostly with all the dogs off the leads. The town grew slowly closer and before long we were traversing the esplanade and the surroundings were urbanising, they weren’t however, getting busier.
Parking was free, most of the bays had slipways on which you could park, for free, almost all of the bays had a free freshwater shower and immaculate toilets and hardly anyone there using them. I didn’t quite understand it. I liked Jersey.
Whence we’d arrived in town we momentarily congratulated each other and went off in search of a pin badge (the only thing we collect after doing these trails) these seem to be becoming a bit of a thing of the past though and usually, unfortunately have to be purchased online. If only we were into fridge magnets…. The grim tchotchkes and knickknack shops were happily few and far between, but unhappily this meant I was unable to purchase my pin badge. It did however lead us into a lovely indoor market where we were recognised by two small blonde children who’d seen us on last nights campsite and somehow deduced we were walking around the whole island. They were very pleased with themselves for spotting us.
Onto the next shopping list item then, gas and a cable for my phone from blacks, a food resupply from Iceland (which in St Helier are NOT Iceland prices let me tell you), some Jersey milk and to the pet store for Eric to resupply too.
Chores complete, milk consumed (nice, but does just taste like every other milk) we sat ourselves down for some much needed wine. Eric had a bit of a rest and we could charge our electricals and wait for the boat to take us to Guernsey. Lovely.
SONDER 