Alderney West
Walked by Sally and Richard, Friday 11th April 2014
About 10 miles of walking (7.5 miles on Channel Island Way) - and lots of pottering
Click here for all our photos from this walk.
There had been quite a lot of noise in the late evening from people talking outside the Georgian House, but it didn’t really disturb us in the night. We slept well and had a good breakfast. Other guests include two elderly male walkers (who have obviously been serious walkers in their day) and a single man. We’d just got back to our room after breakfast when the fire alarm went off – someone was burning toast in the dining room!
We bought pasty-type provisions for lunch from the bread shop opposite the hotel and followed the route of the “Channel Island Way” through the streets of St Anne then down a road that became a track, past grazing horses. We initially turned left onto the coastal path, just for a quick walk to a bench with good views on the many little islands off the coast, including Coque Lihou. Then we turned round and followed the coastal path in a clockwise direction as it turned slightly inland, though never far from the glorious views. The weather was lovely (and stayed so all day).
We reached the World War II bunker, now transformed into the “Alderney Wildlife Trust Countryside Interpretation Centre” and fascinating. Soon afterwards we crossed a wooded valley that is part of the Val du Saou Nature Reserve, with wild garlic and bluebells. Elsewhere today there was gorse, thrift, little violets in the grass and – occasionally – the invader Hottentot fig. We saw rabbits from time to time.
We meandered our way close to the airport, with plenty of activity as small planes landed and took off, including some of Aurigny Airlines’ Trislanders (which fly to Southampton but also to the other Channel Islands). We passed Telegraph Tower, built in 1809 for communication with Guernsey and Jersey by means of a repeating station on Sark, then down to the coast at the two large rocks of La Nache and Fourquie – not sure if these are natural or a result of quarrying.
We walked around Telegraph Bay then turned up the grassy “Vallee des Trois Vaux”. About halfway down the valley Richard heard the seabirds and soon ‘Les Etacs’ a gannet colony, came into view. We walked to the end of the valley, above cliffs, and watched the gannet activity for a while, then we retraced our steps a short distance and took a path which climbed steeply to the top, where there was a bench and an information board and more excellent views of Les Etacs, Ortac (another gannet colony) and Burhou (a flat island that is a bird sanctuary, currently closed because it is the puffin breading season). We were puzzled by a distant island with a lighthouse, but later discovered that this is Les Casquets, actually a reef and with three lighthouses (though only one with a light).
We took a track through the remains of the gun emplacements at Batterie Annes, and Fort Clonque came into view. We were looking for a path down through the gorse, but our first attempt was flawed, since we would have had to jump across a large hole in the ground (part of one of the gun emplacements). We eventually found the path, and zig-zagged our way down with good views of Fort Clonque. Fort Clonque, in common with a number of Alderney’s Victorian forts, is linked to the main island by a causeway. The Channel Island way turns right towards Fort Tourgis, but we decided to walk along the causeway to Fort Clonque. It turns out that Fort Clonque is privately owned (by the Landmark Trust) so we couldn’t get onto the Fort itself, but it was nevertheless interesting. We then sat and ate our lunch on a bench with good views back to Fort Clonque and Burhou, and with gannets diving for fish.
After lunch we followed to coast to Fort Tourgis and around to Saline Bay, where we chose to walk along the beach rather than the sandy track alongside it. We soon reached Braye and pottered around the harbour, then we walked along Braye Common, again diverting onto the white-sanded Braye Beach. At the end of the common we climbed past Mount Hale Battery then took a track which climbed towards Fort Albert. At the top we rounded the corner above the Riselle Battery, and then descended to Bibette Head and Saye Bay.
We decided not to go further today on our round-island walk (we were enjoying our pottering) so we walked inland, followed a path alongside the (not-yet-working) railway, with good views to Longis Bay and Fort Raz to the south. Then we climbed uphill through the golf course (where a policeman had stopped his car, apparently to chat to his friends), with good views to Braye Bay to the north, and then along Longis Road to St Anne.
We went for tea and cake at Jack’s Brasserie then I did some work. We had another lovely meal at the hotel, then walked down to the field by the cricket club, from where we could see the lights on the Mannez Lighthouse in one direction and the lighthouse on Les Casquets in the other direction .