Which Channel Island to choose? (2)
Alderney, Sark or Herm

Three tiny islands, three different sets of traffic rules, and one thing in common: none of them is reached directly from France. Alderney allows cars, Sark allows bikes, Herm allows neither — you walk. Here is which one deserves your day, or your week.

By The Dem-Tukki editorial team·Published 18 September 2026·Updated 18 September 2026·10 min read

After Jersey and Guernsey, compared in part one of this guide, three small islands remain: Alderney, Sark and Herm. Together they would fit into a quarter of Guernsey, they all belong to the same bailiwick, and they are nothing like one another. The way to choose is not to look at photographs but to answer three questions: how much time do you have, are you willing to sleep on the island, and do you want to walk or to cycle?

🏛️ Alderney — the largest of the small

Alderney is the Channel Island closest to the continent: sixteen kilometres from Cap de la Hague, against thirty-two from Guernsey. Just over two thousand people live on its 7.8 square kilometres, all of them in Saint Anne, a village of cobbled streets and Georgian houses. It is also the only one of the three where cars are allowed, with a 35 mph limit island-wide, and the only one with an airport — the oldest in the archipelago, opened in 1935.

Military heritage dominates everything else. In the 1850s the British Crown built eighteen forts and batteries to watch France, plus a breakwater begun in 1847 that runs to 1,463 metres. The Second World War left a far darker mark: Alderney is the only island in the archipelago to have been almost entirely evacuated, in June 1940, before being turned into a fortress with hundreds of bunkers and four labour camps. One of them, Lager Sylt, became in March 1943 the only SS concentration camp on British soil; an official report delivered in May 2024 established that between 641 and 1,027 people died there. The site has been a conservation area since June 2021.

Nature holds its own. The west coast and the islets of Burhou, Les Étacs and Ortac have formed since 2005 the first Ramsar site in the Bailiwick of Guernsey: 8,539 gannet nests were counted there in 2021, more than 1% of the world population. Puffins nest on Burhou in spring, and the island is famous for its blonde hedgehogs, a genetic variant found in around 60% of the local population. Add the only working railway in the Channel Islands, running in former London Underground carriages, and you see why Alderney needs more than a day.

🌌 Sark — no cars, no street lights

Sark fits into 5.45 square kilometres with 562 inhabitants and has no cars at all: the ban is not a marketing line, it is written into island law. Only farm tractors, bicycles, horse-drawn carriages and electric buggies for people with reduced mobility are allowed. You land at Maseline harbour, at the foot of a cliff, and climb to the village either on foot or in the toast rack, the bench trailer towed by a tractor that serves as a shuttle for about £1.50.

La Coupée is the most photographed spot in the archipelago: a rock isthmus three metres wide and ninety long, dropping eighty metres on each side, linking Great Sark to Little Sark. The railings only date from 1900; before that, children going to school crossed on all fours on windy days. The concrete road you walk on today was laid in 1945 by German prisoners of war.

On 31 January 2011 Sark became the first Dark Sky Island in the world. With not a single street light, the Milky Way can be read with the naked eye — which is the argument for sleeping there rather than spending six hours. Another curiosity: the island lived under a feudal system inherited from the sixteenth century until the Reform (Sark) Law of April 2008, and its first democratic election was held only in December 2008. The Gouliot Caves, a Ramsar site, show walls carpeted with sea anemones at the lowest spring tides.

🐚 Herm — two square kilometres, seven beaches

Twenty minutes by boat from Saint Peter Port is all it takes. Herm is a mile and a half long and less than eight hundred metres wide, about two square kilometres at high tide and a good deal more at low tide when the sandbanks appear. The official population is 83, a figure that includes the neighbouring islet of Jethou. The island belongs to the States of Guernsey, which bought it from the Crown in 1949, and is run on a not-for-profit basis by Herm Island Ltd under a lease extended to 2069.

Its distinguishing feature fits in one sentence: no cars and no bicycles. That is what sets it apart from Sark, its car-free neighbour where the bicycle reigns. Only staff tractors and quads move around, mainly to carry luggage. Everything else is done on foot, and the full circuit of the island is 6.3 kilometres, about two hours of walking — nothing is far.

Shell Beach, on the east coast, stretches for almost a kilometre of pale sand made of millions of tiny shells carried in by the Gulf Stream. Belvoir Bay, further south, is a cove sheltered by granite cliffs, ideal for swimming and snorkelling. The heritage comes on the same walk: Saint Tugual’s Chapel, built by Norman monks in the eleventh century, and the Neolithic graves on the Common to the north. One detail nobody anticipates: the landing point depends on the tide — Rosaire Steps on a falling tide, Herm harbour on a rising one.

🚢 How to reach them

None of the three is reached directly from France, with one exception: Alderney, served in season by Manche Îles Express from Diélette and by Alderney Ferry Services from Cherbourg, and linked to Brest via Jersey by the Breton airline Finist’air twice a week from late May to late September. For Sark and Herm, going through Guernsey is compulsory. From Saint Peter Port, Travel Trident runs to Herm in twenty minutes, every day of the year except Christmas Day; Isle of Sark Shipping reaches Sark in thirty-five to fifty-five minutes depending on the vessel and the sea.

The 2026 fares give the order of magnitude. Herm: £19 adult return at full fare, £17 on the Early Bird day return, £9 for a child. Sark, since 18 June 2026: £22.39 adult single, £33.30 day return, £41.61 return over several days. Alderney: from £68 to £84 one way by air from Guernsey, and returns advertised between €43 and €85 from Diélette. A warning for anyone planning far ahead: in February 2026 the States of Guernsey voted to resurface Alderney’s runway, with work scheduled from April to December 2027 and an extended closure of the airport not ruled out.

🛏️ Where to sleep: the real bottleneck

This is what separates the three islands more reliably than the scenery. Alderney is the best equipped: three hotels, including the Braye Beach and the Blonde Hedgehog, half a dozen guest houses, around thirty holiday lets and a campsite at Saye Beach — plus Fort Clonque, a Victorian fort converted by the Landmark Trust and the most spectacular place to stay in the archipelago. Herm offers three options: the White House Hotel, open from 24 April to 30 September 2026 from £195 a night, with its house rule of no clocks, no telephones and no televisions in the rooms; twenty-one cottages open all year; and the Seagull campsite with its nineteen equipped tents.

Sark is the pinch point: around thirty beds in total, of them only two hotels. In July and August you need to book several months ahead. And be careful in winter: in the 2025-2026 season, reduced sailings made the day trip impossible on most days — you arrived without being able to leave the same evening. Two precautions apply to all three islands: banknotes issued by Guernsey are not accepted in the United Kingdom, and mobile coverage and cash machines are unreliable, so carry cash.

📊 Alderney, Sark or Herm: the comparison

❓ Frequently asked questions

🧭 Read more

• Which Channel Island to choose? (1)Jersey or Guernsey: part one of the comparison
• AlderneyVictorian forts, gannets and the archipelago’s only railway
• SarkLa Coupée, bicycles and the first Dark Sky Island in the world
• HermShell Beach, Belvoir Bay and six kilometres of coastal path
• GuernseyThe compulsory base for all three small islands
• JerseyThe largest Channel Island, 22 km from Normandy

The Dem-Tukki editorial team

Dem-Tukki is an independent island travel magazine: 79 destinations covered, in five languages.

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