Category: Europe

After a 3-hour whirlwind exploration of Jersey island, the Domain expedition team heads for Guernsey, the second largest of the Channel Islands. The beauty of the island attracted the French impressionist painter Renoir, and is still a popular tourist destination today. The island is a tax haven and has favorable tax treatment for foreigners, as does the Virgin Islands, Mauritius and Malta. This is the first time in the history of Domain Island Tours that local/public buses will be used to get around and explore. The ccTLD assigned to Guernsey, “.gg”, is a popular domain in the gaming and sports industry as it stands for “good game”.

Guernsey island, known for being the setting of the 2018 film “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society”, is one of the islands that make up the Channel Islands off the coast of Normandy, France, and is an overseas territory of the United Kingdom. While the British government controls foreign affairs and defense, Guernsey has its own parliament and government and a high degree of independence, different from most overseas territories and colonies. The population is about 65,000. The local currency is pound sterling, or the Guernsey pound.

On my way to Guernsey from Jersey. The trip began with a one-hour delay due to airplane maintenance, but our small Blue Islands propeller plane made the trip to Guernsey in about 20 minutes.

When I found the bus stop at the airport the night before, I also found a map of the island’s public bus route. I’ve explored 29 islands so far, but this is the first time to see an island with a local bus route! So, I decided to explore Guernsey by bus. I’ll visit 5 locations on the island.

My starting point is the bus stop near the hotel. I plan to take the bus to the first location, the German Occupation Museum. However, it’s proving difficult to find the bus stop. When I finally come across the bus stop, it simply has “BUS” written on the ground. I guess you tend to think a bus stop means a place with a timetable and a sign with the name of the bus stop, but in Guernsey, some bus stops only have the word “BUS” written on the ground.

Here is the “Town Terminal” bus. I take this bus to the next connecting bus stop.

The bus fare was £1.25. It’s easy to pay with just a swipe of your card.

I head to the 2nd location, Fort Grey Shipwreck Museum, which was once a Napoleonic fort. I’m traveling now to the west coast of the island. The local buses are very handy! Something that looks like a fort can be seen in the distance.

I’ll get off here.

I’ve arrived at Fort Grey . Right in front of me is the Napoleonic fort. Where is the Fort Grey Shipwreck Museum?

I walk in the direction of the fort.

This time we are heading east, away from the west coast to Saumarez Park, our 3rd location, so I wait for bus 91 to Vazon Bay.

It’s here.

We can see the west coast on the left as we drive.

I need to transfer en-route.

Saumarez Park is the largest public park on the island, with a museum of traditional costumes, a cafe, a playground, lawns and a pond.

For the time being, I’ll just walk around this large park.

A lady walking her dog asks me if I am from Japan. “There’s a Japanese garden here”, she says. Let’s take a look.

There’s an ISUZU truck parked here.

James St Vincent Saumarez (4th Baron Saumarez), who was posted to the British legation in Tokyo for three years from 1876, brought in Japanese carpenters and built a Japanese house in Guernsey.

Let’s head towards the town center.

I’m now at St. Peter Port.

Looking for the Japanese restaurant.

I’ve found it. Fukku Izakaya, a Japanese bar and restaurant that serves Japanese food. It just opened on April 29th of this year. It’s pretty busy.

The inside doesn’t really feel like Japan. Huh? What’s that? Those lights hanging from the ceiling… pretty sure I’ve seen something like that before.

It’s shaped like a soy sauce bottle. Nice touch. I was starving, so under the light of the giant soy sauce bottle, I ordered squid tempura, takoyaki, chicken katsu curry and miso ramen.

First to arrive was the squid tempura and takoyaki.

The ramen.

With a full and satisfied stomach, let’s now move on to our final location, the game shop that sells Japanese anime goods.

By using the Google Maps Route Planner, I was able to visit all five locations within the limited time I had available.

I’m waiting for the bus to the airport, but there’s no sign of it.

This could be a problem. The bus I had planned to take has been cancelled, and the buses now arriving were a bit chaotic because they either had the wrong destination sign or they’d forgot to display any sign at all.

After asking other people waiting and the bus driver, I was finally able to board a bus heading to the airport.

Local bus trip in Guernsey – finished successfully! I’ve made it in time for my flight.

I leave the Channel Islands and set off for my next destination.

The “.gg” domain is used by several businesses. At a barbershop.

An organic specialty store.

Co-working Spaces.

Domain Island Tours have reported on how to find and purchase local SIM cards from June 2018 to September 2020. However, since it takes a surprisingly long time to find a store and buy one, from now on we’ll use eSIMs. Switching to eSIM made it easy to sign up for a connection that works in Guernsey. Guernsey eSIM speeds as measured at Guernsey Airport. It was 74Mbps.