Sunday 23 April 2017

Lighthouses

1989: Definitive stamp
The Quesnard Lighthouse featured among Alderney's first definitive set of stamps, although it came along later and a different size because of an increase in the basic postage rate to the UK.  The artist was Gordon Drummond (b1921) who began designing stamps as a hobby but it eventually became his full time career and he has created stamps for 70 postal authorities.

The Quesnard lighthouse was established in 1912 and warns of treacherous waters on the approach to the northerly part of Alderney and Guernsey.  It made another appearance this year in Guernsey's Post and Go stamps but with the light shining out under a sunset. 
Visitors can enjoy a conducted tour of the building.   The lamp has a range of 28 nautical miles and the fog horn emits four blasts every 60 seconds and can be heard in excess of 4 nautical miles.  Its near neighbour is 

on Casquets built in 1724 after the ship owners petitioned the proprietor of the rocks. Today the station is run solely from renewable energy.


The Sark lighthouse is located on the north east of the tiny island and was built in 1913.

The Castle Breakwater lighthouse was constructed in the 1850s and forms one arm of Guernsey's main port.



Les Hanois Lighthouse rises from a reef on the south west of Guernsey.

Bréhon Tower was built in 1856 and the light is mounted on top of the stone fort which was built to guard the shipping channel between Guernsey and Hern and protect the harbour of St Peter Port
Here is the the full set of the lighthouses stamps, designed by Robin Carter and featured on a FDC
2017: Lighthouses (Designer - Robin Carter)

Guernsey Post is vending these stamps at their Smith Street Post Office kiosk specifically for cruise ship tourists visiting the island with an additional inscription which will be updated each time a ship arrives in port.  There are a lot of ships visiting as Ian of the Norvic Philatelic Blog and his contributors calculate here 



An entry to Sunday Stamps II theme - Lighthouses - beam down to See It On A Postcard

6 comments:

FinnBadger said...

A very nice set of post and go stamps. Thanks for sharing them.

viridian said...

Thank you for sharing today!

Bob Scotney said...

I've never managed to find any post and go stamps. These are fine stamps to have.

VioletSky said...

Wasn't exactly sure what post and go stamps were (though I had pretty good idea)
Do you get to choose an image, or just get whatever the vending machine decides to offer?
I was expecting some nice island lighthouses from you this week, and you certainly didn't disappoint (you never do!)

Joy said...

The pictorial Post and Go labels are called Faststamps and when they run out of the issue then the self service machine vends the Machin queens or union flag labels. Sometimes I believe they don't have what is promised. There is a unique code on the labels that indicates the post office branch Unfortunately my nearest machine is 100 miles away so I don't have any direct experience, yet, I keep hoping to find one.

Heleen said...

I love lighthouses so this collection is a joy to see! Thank you for sharing!