Jersey royals might be on your dinner plate, but is the largest Channel Island on your holiday radar? With wood-fired shellfish for supper and cold-water surfing to build an appetite, it should be, says Laura Rowe

British seaside holidays have to work a bit harder, don’t they? While Europe rests on its sunny laurels, we layer up and look for distractions. And Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands (although still only five miles long and nine miles wide), has perfected the art. Here you’ll find coastal adventures, world-class seafood and a landscape rich in history – and all just an hour’s flight from London. 

The Channel Islands were the only German-occupied area in the British Isles during the second world war, and there are reminders of this all over the island, with war bunkers, subterranean tunnels and fortifications. The free-entry Jersey Museum, Art Gallery and Victorian House is a good place to start if you’re a history buff (not least for the giant lamingtons and chunky dulce de leche cookies in its café). Otherwise, medieval Mont Orgueil Castle (with its tales of Norman conquests, French invasions and witch trials, and a veryimpressive dress-up box) is worth a visit for the views over to France. But I’m here for my two loves – fresh air and fresh food. If you’re so inclined, you can walk the entire coastline – all 48.1 miles of it – in one go. We settle for an hour, though, along the Jersey Tidal Trail. There’s so much to take in (read: spots for Instagram pics) along the path – from dramatic cliff faces, volcanic rock and shimmering crystal waters, to wide stretches of sandy beaches, undulating dunes and craggy caves. Indeed, the island undergoes a transformation twice daily with its tidal range – as the sea retreats, Jersey nearly doubles in size – so it’s well worth exploring.

EAT LIKE A NATIVE

Jersey’s breadth of dining options is now about as vast as its scenic variety – a big evolution from my last visit – whether you’re after old-school fine dining with portions as petite as Ozempic vials or you fancy Asian-inspired curries at a beach-side diner with stunning sunsets. One you shouldn’t miss is Pêtchi on the south side of the island, overlooking the harbour and Liberation Monument in St Helier. It describes itself as serving ‘native produce cooked over open fire’ and it shows off the island’s plethora of ingredients the minute you walk in. A glass fridge displays marbled ex-dairy beef, fish caught from the day boats, and hand-dived scallops proudly laid out in their shells. 

The dining room, with its open kitchen, gives a real sense of the action. The menu is hyper-seasonal and exceedingly delicious. Oysters from the Royal Bay of Grouville, on the east of the island, come raw and cooked – the latter wood-roasted, bathed in beef fat and pepped up with fermented chilli. Another shellfish success – a fat, sweet and flamed scallop – bobs in its half shell with elderflower vinegar and an ingenious umami scallop dashi butter. Freshly baked breads arrive plumped like puffer fish, drenched in herb butter and a cloud of pecorino. Don’t leave without ordering the chancre crab crumpets, though – so highly demanded that they’ve become a permanent fixture on the ever-evolving menu. This is some of the best cooking I’ve enjoyed this year. 

If a cosy, candlelit beer is more your kink, then head to the intimate Upstairs at The Bear in St Helier, where there’s an elevated pub menu that changes each month, making the most of what’s in season. Lobster croquettes, butter curry mussels and a beef welly with bone marrow gravy is comforting fodder after an active day aboard hired electric bikes from local business Lakeys. You can go it alone, but we took a tour that covered more than 20 miles around the west side of the island, encountering red squirrels, watermills, woodlands, lighthouses and giant puffins (trust me).

TAKE A DIP 

It’s worth also making the most of the clean waters – I love a cold-water plunge at any time of the year, but there are plenty of ways to stay warm. Sauna Society at the mouth of St Catherine’s Breakwater is a charming wood-fired hut scented with lemongrass, with uninterrupted, panoramic views across the cove, and a sweaty dial hitting 90°C that’s best punctuated with refreshing sea dips. Or head to St Ouen’s Bay with the Jersey Surf School, one of the oldest surf clubs in Europe and with the most patient and chilled teachers – they got this wobbly dude to stand for a whole three seconds. 

A decade ago when I first visited this island, with the promise of fancy hotels and fine dining, I packed heels. Now I’m packing hiking boots, my swimmers and trousers with elasticated waistbands. And if this isn’t a welcome evolution on both of our parts, I don’t know what is.