Friday 16 April 2021
What a funny little island this is. What a curious, luminous, blusteringly beautiful speck of a place. Alderney is the Channel Island that no one has heard of. It is not the biggest one, or the smallest, or the one with famous cows or without any cars. Alderney is the beguiling one. The one you lose your heart to. It is like joining a secret society, flying here in a tinpot 12-seater, buffeted by every breeze. Three square miles, just off France â yet so much space, so much drama in its coastline, heart-skippingly beautiful beaches around every corner. The light! The colour! The sea is kingfisher blue. They say the waters flow all the way from the Caribbean on the Gulf Stream, accounting for the exotic shells along the shore, the dolphins and basking sharks who come for the sunny microclimate (islanders take a dip on New Year s Day). Summer lasts forever here, or seems to. It is not like Britain at all. (It is not, actually, Britain at all.)