Day 9 The Guernsey Coastline
Another very warm, sunny day on Guernsey. I forgot to pick up a map of the island before setting out today so driving has been a bit frustrating, especially for Paul who has had to turn around many times. Many of the back streets are really narrow with high walls or hedges and at junctions it is impossible to see if anything is coming from either direction. Signposting isn’t great either. It there is a sign, it is usually very small and impossible to see until you have driven past it.
After breakfast we headed north west intending to go to Rousse Tower but we drove into a carpark far too early. We had a short walk up the sea front and found a small shed/hut which would have been perfect for Paul so we took a photo.
We then arrived at Rousse Tower which is an 18th century restored sea defence structure/Loophole Tower on a small peninsula overlooking Baie de Port Graf and La Grande Havre Bay. There are an enormous amount of Towers, Forts and Castles on the island so only stopping at a few today.
We then went on to Fort Le Marchant which is the most northerly point on Guernsey and climbed up the fort where there were some good views.
We then headed south, stopping at Bordeaux Beach where we walked up to the ruins of Vale Castle from where we had good views of the coastline north but not so nice views of a very industrialised, including a cement works area to the south.
We drove inland a bit to Chateau de Marais, also known as Ivy Castle. The guidebook said that the most amazing part of this was the drive through a housing estate which resembles an inner city slum area and does not look like anywhere else on Guernsey. Fortunately for those living there, they seem to have modernised this part of the island and all houses looked modern and spacious. The building was hardly a Chateau nor a Castle.
We then had a nightmare drive through St Peter Port and just kept taking wrong turnings or finding the turning that we wanted was “No Entry”. Then when I finally got onto the road we wanted to get to the south of the capital there were signs that it was closed at Route de Sausmarez. As this is the main coast road around the island I would have expected to see diversion signs, but no. With the use of google maps on my phone I was able to guide Paul to the road on the other side of the diversion. By now it was well past lunch time so we made our way to Le Petit Bot Bay which is the smallest beach on Guernsey. We had our lunch on seats overlooking the bay.
It was then a short drive to La Gouffre where we expected to see a waterfall (according to the guide book). We asked some locals where it was and they said they had been there for 20 years and never seen or heard of a waterfall. There was some spectacular coast scenery on a short walk to the headland so we were not disappointed. We had an ice cream at the first open kiosk we had seen all day.
The last visit of the day should have been the Pleinmont peninsula but before long I realised we were on a road across the island instead of around it. Rather than ask Paul to turn around (yet again) we made for L’Eree where we parked overlooking Lihou Island.
There were a few interesting things to see here. First of all Lihou Island, no longer inhabited, is only reachable at very low tide and there is a 2 hour time window to get there and back and it looks like there is quite a bit to explore. As the tide was too high we decided to do this later in our stay. We did walk down the causeway and I paddled in the sea again.
I left Paul at the car and took a short walk up to Fort Saurmanez which is an old tower which was fortified during WW2 adding an extra 4 levels. There are many German trenches still existing in this area. There are two guns on the other side of the headland.
We then drove back to the hotel and I went to a pub restaurant nearby to try and book a table for 2 for tonight. They were fully booked and the next available date was next Monday at 7.45, so I booked this. We really didn’t expect it to be so difficult to get an evening meal at this time of year. In the end we decided to get Fish and Chips from the shop just up the road and ate them outside on their picnic tables. We had ordered Cod and half chips but it was still far too much for both of us but very nice.
We have booked the ferry to Sark tomorrow and booked cycles so we can get around the island in the 5 hours that we will have there
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