Tenerife

We just had two more port days left and both were one after the other so it all seemed very rushed after so many days at sea apart from a few hours on another island. The day before Tenerife we met up again with Rita & Lisa aka Miss nervous of Walvis Bay fame so we agreed to do another taxi share and see a bit of the island. Bright and early the next morning we met them at the bottom of the gangplank at the agreed time and off we set to find a suitable taxi. Rita spoke excellent Spanish so she did all the negotiations for us and interpretations during the course of the day (one of the main reasons why we went with them but also because they are great fun).

The first stop was to a town 8km away, San Cristobal de la Laguna. This was the orginal capital city and is now a UNESCO world heritage site. It was such a lovely town with huge buildings several hundreds years old lining the cobbled streets. We went through a set of impressive double doors and found ourselves in a large courtyard with gardens and fountains with the building wrapped around it. The stories these walls could tell. The oldest cathedral in the islands was just down the road from there, not sure when it was built but it would be around the early 16th centuary at a guess.

An Andalusian nobleman, chap by the name of Alonsa Fernandez de Lugo, led a battle between the Spanish forces and the indigenous Guanches, who were little more than cave men and no match against the Spanish in 1495. Alonsa stayed in Tenerife and married a woman reputed to have had an earlier affair with Christopher Columbus. On three occasions the island was attacked by the British, one of which was on 24th July 1797 when the unfortunate Admiral Horatio Nelson had his right arm blown off. El Tigre, the canon which fired the shot is still on display at one of the local museums. It was a shame we didn't go to see it but we had other places to visit.

We had all particularly wanted to go up to El Teida, a domant volcano towering 3,718 metres above sea level and disappearing into the clouds but we hadn't realized how far it was, we had thought maybe a 40 mintue drive tops. Well, 2 hours later after driving around narrow, hairpin bends and switchback roads, passing amazing tall pine forests swathed in swirling mists then eventually breaking through the clouds to see the bluest skies and the tip of the mountain we had almost made it. We stood at a scenic point and looked down at the clouds swirling against the side of the mountain giving an affect of waves breaking on the shore, it looked just incredible. Far in the distance we could see the sea and another little island. Once we broke through the clouds it got remarkably warmer, being cloudy and a cool 12 deg below it was clear skies and 20 deg above. The rest of the trip up the mountain,  the surroundings became a lot more barren, no more forest or green just what looked like lumps of clay or manure, Jon thought, scattered everywhere and different coloured rock representing different explosions over the centuries. There were clumps of a very pretty purple mountain violet and another plant further up that had one very tall flower, up to 2 metres in height, and was a brilliant scarlet red. We had wanted to go up the cable car which takes you almost to the top of the mountain but 10 million other people had the same idea. It was a 2 hr wait just to get to the cable car which would have put us really short of time so we decided to by-pass that and have a look at some other areas instead. It was a very beautiful national park with its wild barren scerney but at parts had brillant flowers and plants, like a well planned rock garden, formations of rock carved out over centuries and an enourmous crater. Just a little different to the normal city sights.

Back down in town, Santa Cruz de Tenerife where the ship was moored, we had a little wander around with what was left of our time. We saw the enormous monument, Monumento de los Caidos, commemorating those who died in the Spanish civil war of 1936-39. Tenerife played a part in the civil war as it was here that General Francisco Franco plotted with his senior officers a military coup which lead to the war.  All aboard time was 5pm so after a quick session of free wifi at Maccas,  we had to scurry back to make sure we didnt miss the boat. I think it would be well worth coming back for a holiday and can see why its so popular with the British as a holiday destination.  Would like to have seen more of the towns but there is only so much you can see in the few hours that is offered on a port call, sometimes its hard to decide just which parts to see but I reckon on this occasion we made the right choice.