a day on Sark
Friday, May 22nd, 2026 20:11![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_shoshannaI am skipping over yesterday and will hope to describe it later; today I am blogging about today, in an effort to not fall too far behind.
We left pretty early this morning, since we had to be at the ferry dock 45 minutes early, and after an incident yesterday (a minor car accident -- the first we've seen, which is frankly a little surprising) delayed our bus, we wanted to leave plenty of time in case of similar difficulties. We still miiiight have had time to grab some breakfast, but no way was I eating anything other than an antinausea med before getting on a ferry again, and Geoff decided he'd rather wait and get something in Sark.
The weather today was absolutely gorgeous, sunny and gently breezy and even a little too hot. The ferry over to Sark was much smaller than the one from Jersey to here, and we had seats outside on the upper deck with great views, and the sea was calm; I doubt I even needed the pill but I'm not sorry I took it just in case. We saw many jagged rocks gouging up from the water, some of them extra jagged because of all the cormorants on them; and the island of Herm as we passed it (year-round population: about 60; tourists per year: about 100,000); and also the island of Brecqhou, right next to Sark, which is privately owned by the surviving billionaire Barclay brother. The glimpse I got of their castle-mansion looked exactly like you'd expect a
Our plan was basically to walk around the island, and also have a meal or two. The first walk was just up the loooong steeeeeep hill from the ferry dock to the center of the village (and the Visitor Information Centre). We'd more or less assumed we'd ride one of the wagons pulled by tractors (which are the only motor vehicles allowed on the island) that are made available, and that haul overnight visitors' luggage up for delivery to their hotels, but the crowd preceding us off the boat had filled them by the time we walked from the disembarkation point to their parking and loading area, and we didn't want to wait for them to deliver the first load of tourists and come back for more. Also none of the info we'd seen had told us there was a charge for the ride, but then we saw a fee list posted. So we said screw it, it won't be the hardest walk we've done this week, and headed for the footpath up the hill along with a number of other intrepid walkers.
That may have been the nicest walk we did all day, sadly. It was lovely, wooded and shady, steep at times but never grueling, with no particular views to admire but just a green and pleasant passage, very quiet unless a tractor-bus was chugging past us on the road that was paralleling us off to the side, behind a line of trees.
We got to the top, walked through shops and restaurants to the Visitors' Centre and confirmed that they had no maps better than the freebie the ferry company had given us when we checked in, and went to a pub for some food. Well, they weren't going to start serving food until noon, and it was 11:45, so we killed time in an excellent exhibit on life under the Occupation in the hall next door. It included a whole history of the war as Sark experienced it, including awful details about the level of hunger. (Sibyl Hathaway, the Dame of Sark, the feudal lord who ran the island from 1927 when her father died and she inherited the title until she died in 1974, went from what the narration happily described as "a healthy weight of 10 stone" to 7 stone by the end of the war: 140 pounds to 98. The feudal system of government wasn't changed until 2008, and whoever wrote the story of the Occupation clearly adored Dame Hathaway.) There were also stories of a group of local divers and others who worked for the Germans under the threat of danger to their families and communities but who slowed and sabotaged the work as much as they dared; and accounts from someone who was evacuated as a child just before the Germans arrived and from someone who stayed; and many more stories, including the code words that Dame Hathaway and her husband used in letters, to pass on news of the war, after he was deported to a German prison camp.
Anyway, once the pub was open for food, we got some excellent coffee, and Geoff got a quite tasty plate of duck tagliatelle. I, still on my quest to eat my own weight in seafood, got a crab sandwich that the menu board said was made with local foraged seaweed -- how could I turn it down? I'd had a crab sandwich at a beachside kiosk yesterday, which was...acceptable: it was on supermarket sandwich bread, thickly buttered, and wasn't all that good, really. This one was better, on a crusty roll that was still buttered but at least only lightly, and the chopped seaweed that was mixed into it didn't add a noticeable flavor but maybe it was a bit more...umami? The crab itself did taste better than yesterday's sandwich. But on the whole I think I'll give up on crab sandwiches. Geoff's pasta was better.
After lunch, we set out to walk to Little Sark, a chunk of land that hangs like a teardrop of the south end of Sark proper, connected by a high and narrow land bridge called La Coupée. Until 1902, when the first safety railing was installed, Little Sark children on their way to school would crawl across it on their hands and knees to avoid being blown off. Now it has sturdy railings on both sides, and also a smooth and somewhat leveled walkway, paved down each side but left as dirt in the middle so that horses could get a better footing, that was constructed by German prisoners of war in 1945-46. It was a very dramatic crossing; I hope Geoff's pictures came out!
But the walk to La Coupée wasn't anything special, and on the other side the dry dirt roadway was wide and unshaded and between banks so there were almost no views. We had been hoping to get to a Neolithic dolmen at the far end of Little Sark, but we didn't really have time before we had to report to the return ferry, and the walking wasn't pleasant, so we gave up and turned around. Wandered back through town, got Geoff an ice cream, and took the nice footpath down the hill again. Since we had some time, we went from the ferry harbor through a short tunnel bored right through the rock to the boating harbor next to it, which is one of the smallest working harbors in the world. It's almost entirely enclosed by a breakwater, making it also a nice place to swim; several people were in the water, and so was a very happy dog. Then we went back and stood on the ferry dock waiting for the ferry. I'm pretty sure I saw a jellyfish in the water; it was a foot or so below the surface, which was several yards below me, and it wasn't very big, so it's hard to be sure; but it was definitely moving differently from the water around it, and it definitely seemed to be blooming and contracting, blooming and contracting, as a jellyfish would. So I'm going to say I saw a jellyfish! That was exciting; I don't think I've ever seen one in the wild before, unless you count the Portuguese man o' war that stung me when I was a child.
I took another pill before the return ferry ride, and although I hadn't felt that the first one affected me at all, I definitely got hit by "may cause drowsiness" on the way home! I actually fell asleep sitting up (we had great seats on the outside upper deck again) and dreamed of figuring out buses for tomorrow's excursions. Neither Geoff nor I felt we wanted (or could manage) dinner after that big lunch, but I did want a little something, so we stopped at the M&S food hall again on the way to the bus home: I got a couple of tea cakes with dried fruit, and he got a bottle of beer 😀 (Alcohol is contraindicated with the meds, but that didn't stop me having a couple of swallows!) Consumed them back at the hotel after bath and showers, and have been blogging every since.
Tomorrow, the plan is to visit the main local farmers market -- I love farmers markets! -- and pass by a 4000-year-old goddess statue, and then in the afternoon tour a local cidery, which means many samples of cider, plus biscuits, cheeses, and the cidery's own apple chutney. Might be another day without dinner!
