Tim & Denise Tiner Travels: 2024 England - April - Guernsey Trip - Day 02

April 16th, 2024

Denise has a horrible cold and struggled sleeping. Our bed is a full bed, pretty small. So that made it kind of difficult to sleep too. But we both got through the night. I’m sorry she is not feeling well. I hope it passes quickly.

We had a lazy morning, reporting to breakfast a bit after 9 AM. We ate and then caught the 91 bus that takes you the long way around the island arriving into town St Peter’s Port. Our breakfast here at the hotel is really nice. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s breakfast. The ride around the island was pretty spectacular. The side we are on has many wonderful looking beaches and sea. It also is dotted with German strong holds that they built to protect their stronghold here. The Germans poured more concrete on Guernsey than any where else during the war.

We arrived at St Peter’s Port and immediately went out to the Lighthouse. It was a good walk. It was well worth it. Not a big Lighthouse however, But it was fun to watch one of the ferries come out an head out to sea.

After the Lighthouse, we went to Castle Cornet which originally was built on a small island next to St Peter’s Port. Now they’ve built a large pier structure that takes you to the castle\fort and the Lighthouse. We toured the castle\fort for a couple of hours with the highlight being them shooting off a canon at noon all dressed in their military garb. It was fun to watch.

After the castle visit, we hiked up the hill to Hauteville House…the house where Victor Hugo exiled to and wrote many books, including Les Miserables. While there, one of his great, great grandsons was there with much media following him. I’m not sure why he was seen as so important. But it was interesting watching him get grad A treatment. Victor Hugo’s house was unique and that’s an understatement. Quite gaudy if you want my opinion. However, his garden and views of his garden and St Peter’s Port marina was absolutely amazing. Just spectacular. On a clear day, he can see all the Channel Islands and France. Pretty nice.

After visiting Victor’s house, we continue our hike up the hill to Candie Gardens. This was a park set in the middle of urban living that looked out over the sea. It was quite nice. They have a museum there. But we were kind of burnt out on seeing old things. So we did not stay and headed over to see Elizabeth’s College. The main building looked amazing and drew us to it. This was our last tourist stop as we shifted into finding food. We ended up in a Crepe restaurant which turned out to be quite good.

We caught the 91 bus again to complete our island circle arriving back to our hotel about 5:30 PM. It was a fun day.

Pictures:

This is how our day started…with a hearty breakfast sandwich and eggs. They also had a continental breakfast that you could help yourself to as well. All very yummy and good.

Some shoreline as we drove around the island. This is a rocky part. But there were many, many sandy beaches along the way.

Part of St Peter’s Port marina.

The dike like structure that we walked on out to the Lighthouse.

The ferry leaving port and passing the Lighthouse.

Looking back at the harbor town of St Peter’s Port.

The fellows who fired the cannon. The cannon is behind them and the gun powder exploded quite loudly. Surprised us all.

I believe this is the back of Victor Hugo’s house in the garden area.

The next photos are of rooms in Hauteville House. Strange place by designed by Mr. Hugo.

The picture above, if you can believe it is in his bedroom.

We were standing by his bed and shot this looking out. The picture below is looking down into the garden. You can see the party interviewing the great, great grandson for some reason. I don’t know why.

Some of the many steps we had to go up and down to get around this town.

We popped into a church and I liked this stained glass window of Jesus walking on water with Peter when he loses his faith and begins to sink. Very pretty it is.