ONLY a few minutes’ drive from the airport, St. Ouen’s Bay is simply spectacular, stretching along almost the entire west coastline of Jersey. What’s more, visit out of season and there’s every chance you can have the place to yourself.

Last time I was there, the sun was shining, the sky was impossibly blue and the rolling waves of the Atlantic Ocean were crashing in all the way from America’s Eastern seaboard.

I’d just arrived for a stay at the Atlantic Hotel up on the headland overlooking the bay but stopped off en route from the airport at one of my favourite spots: a beach bar eatery called Le Braye.

Here, I sat outside, eating crab sandwiches and supping the island’s Liberation Ale as the beach slowly attracted the late afternoon surfers who favour the location.

The road running the length of the bay is known as ‘Five Mile Road’, by the way, but don’t bother measuring it out. Neither the road nor the beach is five miles long.

It’s thought the name is mis-translation of the old Jersey word ‘Mielle’ or sand-dune, of which many line the opposite side of the road and make for a great viewpoint to admire the bay.