Walking on Guernsey. Paddy Dillon

      INTRODUCTION

      ‘Morceaux de France tombés à la mer et ramassés par l’Angleterre.’ ‘Pieces of France fallen into the sea and picked up by England.’

      Victor Hugo

      Small and often very busy, but also beautiful and abounding in interest, the Channel Islands are an intriguing walking destination. The self-governing ‘bailiwicks’ of Guernsey and Jersey owe their allegiance to the Crown and seem outwardly British, but are in fact an ancient remnant of the Duchy of Normandy, with Norman–French place-names very much in evidence. For British visitors, it is like being at home and abroad at the same time. French visitors, however, find it a quintessentially British experience!

      Walkers will find magnificent cliff and coastal paths, golden sandy beaches, wooded valleys and quiet country lanes. Flowers will be noticed everywhere and there is a rich birdlife. There are castles, churches, ancient monuments and fortifications to visit, as well as a host of other attractions. There are efficient and frequent bus services, and easy onward links by air and sea between the islands. This guidebook describes 24 one-day walking routes, covering a total distance around 225km (140 miles), plus a long-distance coastal walk around the island of Guernsey, almost 65km (40 miles). There is also a note about the Channel Island Way, a long-distance island-hopping route embracing the entire archipelago, covering 178km (110 miles) (see Appendix A).

Location

      The Channel Islands lie south of Britain, but not everyone immediately appreciates how close they are to France. The islands fit snugly into a box bounded by lines of longitude 2°W and 3°W, and lines of latitude 49°N and 50°N. This puts them well and truly in the Golfe de St Malo off the Normandy coast of France, The French refer to them as Les Îles Anglo-Normandes, and that is the clue to their curious place in geography and history. They are the only remnants of the Duchy of Normandy to remain loyal to the Crown.

      Guernsey is the second largest of the Channel Islands after Jersey, with an area of only 63km2 (24½ square miles). The smaller neighbouring islands of Alderney, Sark and Herm together add less than 15km2 (6 square miles) of land area. No point on Guernsey is more than 3km (2 miles) from the sea, yet it can take weeks to explore the place thoroughly.

Geology

      In Britain virtually every major geological period is represented. Channel Islands geology is more closely related to structures in France. Rocks are either very ancient or relatively recent, with hundreds of millions of years missing from the middle of the geological timescale. Fossils are virtually absent and the amount of sedimentary rock is quite limited. Most of the area is made up of ancient sediments and igneous rocks which have been heated, warped, crushed, deformed, melted and metamorphosed. Further intrusions of igneous rocks cause further confusion for the beginner, but there is a basic succession that can be presented in a simplified form.

      The most ancient bedrocks in the Channel Islands are metamorphic and metasedimentary rocks known as ‘Pentevrian’ – a term used in neighbouring France. Ancient gneisses, often containing xenoliths of other long-lost strata, feature in this early series. Dating rocks of this type is possible only by examining radio-isotopes in their mineral structure, which suggest dates of formation ranging from 2500 to 1000 million years ago. The oldest rocks occur in southern Guernsey, western Alderney and possibly on Sark.