Day 1 - Getting to Jersey

Beer drunk: 0 pints; Wine: 3 glasses
Distance walked: unknown

Slept badly as I was worried I would sleep through the alarm and miss my flight, so I kept waking up to check the time.  Of course, I was soundly asleep when it did go off.  Below is a picture of the view outside my hotel window.  It is a boring picture as it was a boring view.  The key feature to note is the fog.

This day as been an even mixture of good and bad luck.  My karma is very balanced right now.  My London hotel was very handy for the train to the airport, only a short 5 minute walk away.  It isn't an underground line but very much an above ground one.  Four storeys up to be precise and the lift was out of order.  Luckily I packed light.  I got to the airport early as I was worried that getting through security might be time consuming.  It wasn't.  I breezed through but then the airport was shut down due to the fog.  Many flights were cancelled.  Luckily mine was just delayed - by 2 hours.  In all I spent 4 hours at the airport and only 1 in the air.  Two of those 4 hours I spent pacing up and down and up and down the airport.   You could tell that particular airport (London City Airport) specialises in flying businessmen to business meetings.  Fully half the seats in the lounge area had powerpoints and USB ports specifically for charging up laptops and phones.  The bookshop also seemed to have the complete series of "The Financial Times Guide To" something-or-other.

Distinctly on the plus side of the ledger, I did get to have some good coffee.  How many good luck points did that cost I wonder.  It was coffee from an airport cafe and in the UK and only moderately outrageously expensive.

Below is a photo of the plane that took me to Jersey.  Not quite as dinky as I had expected but distinctly smaller than the A380 that got me to London.  I think it is capable of carrying about 60 passengers compared to the 450+ of the A380.  The passengers were a mix of business men in suits and elderly couples plus me.

After checking in to my hotel, I set out in search of lunch.  It was a lovely day today.  Sunny, with clear skies and a top of 26C.  I came across a place just off the main shopping strip that had outdoor table and appeared to be a pleasant bistro so I marched on it.  It turned out to be one of the classier restaurants on the island, with a Michelin starred chef no less - Ormer.   After the usual performance ("let me just check if we have a free table" which of course they did since 80% of them were empty) I was seated.  I had the 3 course set menu with a glass of wine.   It began with an small aranicini (arancino?) strongly flavoured with parmesan as an amuse bouche.  It was very tasty and suitably crunchy on the outside and creamy in the middle.  My entree was a salad of goat's cheese with (orange!) beetroot and hazelnuts.  The cheese was suitably tangy without being too goaty.  My main was not so successful as it was a (fresh) cod fillet with mashed potatoes, puy lentils and chorizo. While cod is a fairly meaty fish for a fish, it was no match for the spicy chorizo, which dominated the flavour of everything.  Dessert was an absolutely divine raspberry souffle with clotted cream ice cream.  I finished with an espresso, which of course came with petit fours in the shape of chocolates and turkish delight on a bed of chocolate "dirt".  This cost a grand total of 37 GBP which I thought was good value - and no tip.  I wasn't given the opportunity to pay one, even if I had wanted to.  I am disposed to like Jersey very much.

After lunch I had planned to wander to get my bearings before being cultured and visiting a museum or two.  However, after the leisurely lunch and the leisurely saunter around St Helier by the time I got to the Maritime Museum it was about to shut.  I had to settle for taking a picture of a 32 pound carronade out the front.  I don't know why they gave it that ugly, thick coat of black paint.  A lack of sailors to keep it well polished I suppose.

After a wash and brush up at the hotel I headed out to dinner.  I went somewhere a little more downmarket for this, the local Italian place - La Cantina, which had suitably flirty Italian waiters.  To begin I had a Caprese salad with buffalo mozzarella.  You could tell by the taste it was the real stuff and tasty it was too.  Black marks for the tasteless cherry tomatoes and no bread!  Bread had to be ordered separately.  For main I had a Porcellini pizza which lived up to its name with toppings of crispy pancetta, mortadella and a sugo made with spicy pork sausage.  There was also a scattering of mushrooms as token veg.  The base was nicely thin and crispy.  For dessert I had affocato (their spelling) which had a good slug of amaretto liqueur but the ice cream was boring, store bought vanilla.  To drink I had two glasses of the house red which was sourced directly from the farm in Puglia - someone's cousin's place I expect.

It was a pleasant meal but the service was erratic.  It began well but then a couple came into the restaurant who were old friends of one of the waiters.  That waiter spent 30 minutes (I timed him) chatting with the couple, before taking their order, let alone serving anyone else.  The other poor waiter was run off his feet as the restaurant was filling up.  This time I was given the opportunity to leave a tip, and pointedly so.  I did leave one as I felt my waiter deserved it.  I hope he doesn't have to share it though.

Tomorrow I start walking for real.