Storm Brian

We were due to take the ferry over to the small Channel Island of Sark, where cars are banned and where light pollution is so minimal that it was designated in 2011 as the world's first Dark Sky Island.

But Storm Brian had other plans, whipping up impressive seas off Guernsey's coast. So we watched the waves from the south-western point of the island, looking across at Les Hanois Lighthouse, named after the reef on which it sits. It was erected in 1862 in response to an increasing number of  shipwrecks. The helicopter pad was added in 1979. The last keeper left in 1996 following automation.