Madrid

January 14, 2020

The flight to Madrid arrived in the mid afternoon. The Prado Art Museum is open until 8:00, so I had a few hours to visit. The meseum is free after 6:00, but there was a huge line and they only let in size-limited groups every 15 minutes. Not liking my odds of getting in with a reasonable amount of time to look around, I strolled to the nearby Gardens de Buen Retiro. 

At sunset, I wandered over to the theater district. The Broadway Musical Anastasia was playing tonight (1). I asked at the box office in the best Spanish I could muster for a balcony seat for tonight. The young lady eyed me skeptically: "Do you want to do this in English?" She reminded me the show was in Spanish: "How will you understand?" "Music is universal" I said. "Sí" she replied with a smile.

I read a plot synopsis online and, except for the cramped seats (Ryanair has now legroom), I thoroughly enjoyed the show.

(1) Which was probably a more authentic Spanish experience than the ubiquitous Flamenco shows, with all foreign tourists in the audience. I had seen a Flamenco show before anyways. The crowd at Anastasia were all locals.

Waiting for curtain time

Ferry to Las Palmas

January 13, 2020

In various places in Tenerife, I noticed Scottish flags (blue background with a white X). I knew a lot of Britons visited and retired here, but this explanation seemed inadequate for the number of flags I saw. At the ferry terminal, in an official-looking position, the Scottish flag was flying together with the national and provincial colors. I double checked: the Scottish and Tenerife flags are the same (1).

The Ferry to the neighboring Island if Gran Canaria had a small outside deck on the back, where I enjoyed the view and fresh air and sea spray. The ferry was almost empty; it is low season here. There were a total of only 11 foot passengers (although more were travelling with their cars). The seas were moderate, as our destination was to leeward. The seas and winds increased as we rounded the headland near Las Palmas, and the waves were breaking vigorously on the headland rocks.

The bustling port at Las Palmas is enormous, with cargo ships and fuel tankers coming and going. The port also seems to be a place for refitting: I noticed an Arctic exploration ship from Halifax hauled out of the water (on the hard), but still flying the Canadian ensign, with a Spanish courtesy flight fluttering from the starboard shrouds. The port area is so large that the bus took almost 15 minutes to make its way to the exit.

Gran Canaria's shape is like an orange, with the stem at Las Palmas (pivoted about 45 degrees east of true north) and a leaf at the end at Péninsula de de Isleta. I lingered in the afternoon on the 3 km long Playa (Beach) de Las Canteras. One particularly large wave nearly swept my shoes into the sea (2)

Sitting at a seaside café at sunset, I noticed Mt. Teide on Tenerife (3) looming above the mist in the gloaming. Before sunset, there was too much light, soon there would be too little. I enjoyed the Teide view during the brief interval.

During a long walk along the beachside promenade, the lighthouse on the headland was visible. Judging by its brightness and location, it is a major landfall light with a distinct flashing pattern: 1 flash, 8 seconds dark, 3 flashes, 8 seconds dark, 1 flash etc.

(1) There are different theories for why the flags ate the sane: (a) Scotland and Tenerife share the same patron saint (St. Andrew); (b) the islanders flew the flag in defiance of a failed attempt by Lord Nelson to capture the Island during the Napoleonic Wars; (c) they are not the same flags: they are slightly different shades of blue.

(2) Fortuitously, there was a running shoe store about 50 yards from where I was; thankfully it was unnecessary.

(3) About 75 miles away, as the crow flies.

Leaving Tenerife

La Playa de Las Canteras at Las Palmas

Close call with my shoes

View to the southwest

Mt. Teide on Tenerife looming above the mist. (I was pleasantly surprised my mobile phone camera could sort-of capture the image.)

In & on the water at Los Cristianos

January 12, 2020

In Santa Cruz in the north of Tenerife, Spanish is the most common language heard on the streets. In the southern town of Los Cristianos, it is English. The town seems to be the tourist hub of Tenerife (1) (2).

A dive shop in Los Cristianos offered a discounted combo pack of activities. The scuba dive began with a walk to the beach (3), fully laden with weights, tank &c. Graceful is not the right word to describe my lumbering across the loose rocks. The slope of the sea floor was gradual down to about 40 feet, with many colorful fish.

After lunch, we paddled out to a fish farm and watched a pod of dolphins. A cliff-sided cove is the place to jump off the kayak into the water to snorkel while looking for turtles. No luck today.

The drive back north on the dry east side of the Island included many windsocks so drivers can see the direction of the wind, which is quite strong here. Various electricity-generating windmills are situated along the eastern shore. On the car radio, RNE (Radio National de España) was playing choral pieces by American composers performed by Orchestras and Choirs from Universities in the American Midwest.

(1) There are a large number of English and German (a) pensioners who appear to spend part of the winter here. They all seem to converge on the seaside promenade at midday, so many sitting in electric scooters that an NFL wide receiver would have trouble dodging them.

(a) While scanning through stations on the car radio, I noted at least one broadcasting in German.

(2) According to the official statisics, more Britons visit the Canary Islands each year than Spanish people from the mainland.

(3) My (limited) previous scuba experiences involved jumping off a boat, which seems to be easier than walking in from a rocky beach.

We were diving beneath these sailboats

Snorkeling behind these cliffs

Truth in advertisng? A lad could go broke betting on sports (sign in Los Cristianos)

Teide National Park

January 11, 2020

Low clouds this morning as the car began the ascent up to Parc Nacional Teide, home of Spain's highest peak: Mount Teide, at 3,718 meters (a little over 12,000 feet). At about 2,000 feet, I drove into the clouds and rain, and the trees changed from palms to tall pines. At about 4,000 feet, the sun shone again, and the clouds were now down below. 

Lookout spots soon afforded spectacular views of Volcanic Mount Teide above the clouds. The mountain had the classic cone shape;  if you asked a child to draw a volcano, it would look like Teide. Looking to the east the peaks of Gran Canaria were visible across the sea (of water and clouds), as were the heights of La Palma (1) to the west.

The next milestone was the tree line at about 6,000 feet and the Azuña Atmospheric Observatory. The 8 foot poles marking the road for snow plows begin at the tree line, although there was no snow today, and temperatures were mild: in the mid teens Celsius (about mid 50s F). Today is Saturday with ideal weather, so the whole Park was busy with locals (many riding up on bicycles) and tourists from the south of the Island (2).

The Teide cable car base station is at 2,358 meters (about 7,700 feet), but the timed tickets were sold out for the day (3). I lingered to acclimatize to the altitude for a little while (and to get some caffeine in the form of a very tasty Cafe Con Leche).

A short drive south is the trailhead for Los Roques (the rocks) de Garcia. Climbing on the well-marked trail, I soon realized that the distinctive rock formations marked the rim of an absolutely enormous caldera and pondered how much energy had been released when the volcano blew and formed the caldera.

After a couple of kilometers, the return of my altitude headache told me it was time to head back down. On the descent, a pair of Irishmen (4) passed me, rushing to catch the last bus down to the south coast. I told them to find me if they missed the bus as I was heading  to the town of Los Cristianos and they were also. 

At the crowded café, I was joined by four hikers from Belgium. They asked why I had come to Tenerife (few Americans come to the Canaries). I told him because I found a round trip flight for $350 ftom Boston. He seemed to think that was a good reason.

On the descent, some cyclists almost kept pace with the car which was doing between 60 and 70 kph (about 36 to 43 mph) (5). The cloud cover was still there from about 4,000 feet down to 2,000 feet. Emerging below the clouds revealed glimpses of the sun on the sea, with La Gomera Island (6) looming to the southwest. 

At dinner, the owner sat down at a nearby table and gave a big yawn. He motioned to another nearby restaurant to point out the sound of a lounge singer crooning worn-out hits from the 1970s and 1980s. With a smile he pulled ear plugs from his pocket and offered them to me in jest: "20 euros" he quipped.

(1) The island of La Palma is not to be confused with Las Palmas, the largest city on Gran Canaria, as some travelers flying to, or with hotel reservations in, the wrong place are said to do.

(2) While tourism is a Mainstay of the Tenerife economy, the tourists appear to stay mainly in the south on the dryer side of the island. To my surprise, I heard almost no English spoken on the north side of the island which appears to have a more diversified economy including an oil refinery in Santa Cruz.

(3) Probably just as well, as I do not do well at elevation, and being whisked up to almost 12,000 feet would probably have exacerbated the mild altitude headache I was already experiencing.

(4) Like almost everyone from Ireland I've encountered, they have relatives in the Boston area, seeming to know Eastern Massachusetts better than the natives: "My cousins on my father's side live in Marblehead, near to Salem."

(5) My record bicycle speed is 44 mph, which I am not in a hurry to repeat.

(6) La Gomera was the last Port of Call for Christopher Columbus before he set out across the Atlantic in 1492.

Above the clouds and tree line

First views of Teide

Azuña Atmospheric Observatory

Teide, view from the South (Note the tall pole to guide the snowplows, but not today)

Los roques de Garcia

A Bertholot' s Pipit sharing my path

Views of the Caldera

Views to Los Roques de Garcia from the other side of the Caldera

Hardy pine alone at about 6,000 feet

Top of the clouds on descent

Descending into the clouds. The peaks of the Island of La Palma are visible in the distance

Breaking through underneath the clouds

Glimpses of sunset, Los Cristianos

Tenerife Norte

January 10, 2020

The Canary Islands are a Spanish Archipelago 1,300 km SSW of mainland Spain, off the African coast east of the Morocco/ Western Sahara border (1). Tenerife is the largest of the Canary Islands with a roughly pear shape, rotated about 60 degrees east of true North. 

The flight landed at Tenerife Norte Airport (2), in a col between the mountains transecting the islands at about the point the pear-shape narrows to the long stem. 

I had planned to drive into the Northern Mountains, but there was low cloud cover and rain at the airport's altitude, so the mountain drive (higher up) would have been in the fog. I therefore descended to the coast to drive the coastal highway north from Santa Cruz de Tenerife under cloudy skies with sunny breaks (3).

The road is quite narrow and has been carved into the rocky cliffs, particularly north of Playa (Beach) de las Teresitas. The road ends at the small town of Igueste de San Andrés. On the return, I descended the very-steep side road to Playa de Las Gaviotas, a black sand beach (4) where a few guys in wetsuits were catching a few waves on boogie boards. A young couple ran into the water without wetsuits. In the time-honored tradition, I rolled up my pants and waded in (3); the water wasn't cold at all.

After dinner, the waitress offered me a complimentary cream liqueur: Crema de Orujos. It was delicious. When I asked to see the bottle (thinking I might try to find it at home) she told me it was homemade. Since I was interested, the chef also gave me a large shot of his homemade limoncello which the chef made using his Italian grandmother's recipe. Getting up slowly after a glass of wine and two liqueurs, I staggered to the seaside Promenade.

There was a Portuguese square rigged tall ship festooned with flags and lights. The full moon was rising right between the mainmast (middle) and foremast. On the way back to the hotel later, I heard the bosun's pipe trilling as he or she piped a group of people off the ship.

The London Philharmonic was in town, playing Tchaikovsky & Sibelius at the Adán Martín Theatre on the sea front. The crowd was quite enthusiastic, calling the conductor back on stage with their applause  four times.

(1) Although Western Sahara has been occupied by Morocco for decades.

(2) Tenerife Norte (a) airport is the site of the worst crash in civil aviation history in which two 747s (KLM and PanAm) collided on the runway in heavy fog in 1977 (b). As a result of the crash investigation,  communication protocols between the tower and aircraft were modified and standardized. The role of co- pilots was also strengthened.

(a) Just Tenerife Airport at the time; Tenerife South airport opened in 1978.

(b) While there was a low cloud cover today, visibility on the runway was good (i).

(i) Twice in the last two years I have been on the aircraft that had to abort just before landing and go around due to insufficient visibility on the runway. 

(3) Due to the prevailing winds, sea temperatures, and widely varying elevations, Tenerife has a wide variety of microclimates.

(4) When showering later, I noted a large volume of black sand near the shower drain that I had brought with me on my feet.

Playa de Las Gaviotas

The coastal road

End of the road

Black-sand La Gaviotas Beach

Portuguese square-rigged tall ship at moonrise

Adán Martín Theatre (2003) on the sea front. Presumably inspired by the Sydney Opera House.