Just our luck – castaways at Herm’s real ale festival

The following letter (safely sealed in a plastic bottle) was delivered this morning by a friendly seal:

Dear all,

It was an uneventful trip that brought us to Herm Island, the smallest of the ‘rocks’ that make up the Channel Islands, despite our best efforts to fall into the sea while clambering onto the small boat laden down with far too much luggage.

It took more than 30 years for me to visit Herm and now I’m here I can see that I should definitely have made the effort before now. It’s glorious. We spent the first hour walking round the postcard-like mini-town, making patronising ‘awww’ noises at how cute everything is and generally annoying everyone we encountered on the small lanes and marvelling at how people could live here.

I fear for my companion, Mark, who has been helping me sample the 40-odd ales that are at the heart of the festival. Stupidly, we set ourselves the challenge of trying every ale on offer. About halfway through, as we were grimacing our way through a disgusting tar-like concoction that tasted of chocolate (not in a good way), one of the waiters asked us, simply, ‘Why are you doing this?’.

We didn’t really have an answer. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. Much like when blokes approach ‘all you can eat buffets’ as a contest to eat as much as they can, rather than as much as they want, we wanted to complete our ale challenge just because we had said we would.

Some of them were very nice, usually the golden ones that most closely resembled lager, some were a bit too much and some were just too… well, bitter. But we finished the list by the third night and, ignoring the hollow sense of achievement and the pitying stares of our partners as we high-fived to mark the occasion, we were able to turn our attention to the huge list of ciders.

‘Now we can drink whatever we want,’ Mark said excitedly, scanning the menu.

‘But that’s what we’ve been doing since the start,’ my girlfriend said. ‘It’s what everyone’s been doing.’

I don’t think she was too impressed with our approach, though both her and Mark’s wife, Lucy, did enjoy the next challenge we set ourselves – going for a swim at Belvoir Bay in the rain. They held the towels while we dunked under the water for a millisecond before hot-footing it back up the hill.

We have also met some very interesting characters.

As we exited our cottage after our first night in paradise, we encountered an inquisitive, bold chicken in the lane. We stopped to say hello, snap a few pictures and pat him lightly on the head. But as we walked away, a sinister-looking woman came out of her house and stared at us.

‘Morning,’ I called out.

She did not reply, which is fine – not everyone’s a morning person. But then she got out a pad and paper and, as far as I could tell, began either writing down our descriptions or sketching us. As intimidating gestures go, it’s a good one and we were left puzzling over what we had done to attract such attention. Maybe the chicken was a celebrity in Herm and we were in trouble for hassling him? Maybe taking photos of Herm residents was frowned upon because they saw it as witchcraft? Either way, we made sure to keep out of the chicken’s way whenever we saw him again over the next few days – even when he tried to follow us on our walk round the island – in case we unwittingly broke the law again.

We may have brought too much stuff with us and we certainly ordered too much on our grocery shopping list – forcing us to have some unusual meals, including a feast comprised only of cheese (five types), chocolate Hobnobs and yet more ale. In fact, having worked out that the only vegetables to pass our lips in three days was a bit of lettuce in a cheeseburger and the tomatoes on a fried breakfast, I’m amazed that we have not yet contracted scurvy. We also have an unopened box of lager that we are yet to touch – proving that you really don’t need to take your own beer to a festival where they are selling quite a lot of beer.

We are enjoying the pace of life very much and finding Herm a very accommodating place – especially the seasonal staff and the owners of the pub. It’s a bit like being part of a happy, affluent commune and it makes neighbouring Guernsey look like a smog-filled metropolis across the way.

I won’t miss the hills, though. Herm is probably the least flat place on Earth and getting anywhere requires either a workout for your calves going uphill or that strange half-run you do when walking down steep slopes. Also, trying to walk up a 45-dagree angle while balancing two glasses of ale is not getting any easier, no matter how many times we repeat the action.

With plenty of time to relax and reflect on our relatively hectic lives back in Jersey, we also drew up a shared ‘bucket list’ to keep us busy for the next few years. It seemed a bit unmanageable in the cold light of day and some of the suggestions were just weird (Mark insisted on including ‘punch a clown in the face’) but I’ll be happy if we manage to complete a few others, such as doing parachute jumps, visiting the Maldives and spending New Year’s Eve in Herm.

Yep, we love it so much we’re already planning our next trip. With Herm having another ale festival in September, we may be back even earlier.

Until then, if I’m not back in Jersey next week I’d suggest that someone ask a few questions of that chicken.

Ramsay Cudlipp