#Beaches

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Tenerife, Day 4

It had rained pretty hard at times overnight but there was a pause in the rain when we got up on Sunday, September 25th.

The weather wasn’t expected to be any better than yesterday and a lot of places were still closed so we went back to Sweet Franks for breakfast. It was just as good as it had been yesterday.

As we sat and eyeballed the cloud cover, we decided we’d drive up to see it conditions were any better at Parque Nacional del Teide to see the volcano. We didn’t really believe they would be but we set off to find out anyway.

Hard to get good images out the car window

Soon we were climbing the hills in a dizzying array of switchbacks. I don’t want to say the Spanish are crazy but according to the GPS, the speed limit was 90 km/h on that stretch of road.

It wasn’t long before we were at the top of the mountain. At least it looked that way as you couldn’t see up hill very well.

You couldn’t see down all that well either.

So, back in the car to climb higher.

The big patches of white are banana plantations.

Sometimes we’d get out of the rain into patches of almost blue sky, but then it was back to rain and mist in no time.

Apparently the storm was causing problems with flooding and damages in places around the Canary Islands but the most we saw was debris on the road.

We did see a lot of places with rocks and such on the road but no real damage otherwise.

What you could see of the landscape looked kind of cool.

The rain was down to a mist as we passed Paradores Cañadas del Teide on our way to the cable car at Teleférico del Teide.

Visibility was good enough for us to see the road closed gate and not much else.

We were a bit bummed but not surprised by this and we headed back to see what was at Paradores Cañadas del Teide.

It’s a visitor centre with a restaurant, washroom and giftshop.

Lynda and Lucille did some shopping in the giftshop and found a few nice things to bring home.

With our planed outing being a bust, we headed back down a different road in search of lunch.

We ended up in a familiar place; Centro Comercial Safari shopping mall. We knew things were open there so we thought we’d play it safe to find food.

We ended up at Roma Restaurant – Pizzeria; right beside where we had lunch yesterday.

It was very good Italian food and drink.

It wasn’t raining when we had finished eating so we walked about a block to Playa del Camisón beach to could check it out.

It was another really nice beach and we walked in the surf for a while.

The breakwater made the water quite calm but my bride showed a lot restraint and only waded knee deep as she walked along.

We walked along the beach for a while and decided to head back to the apartment.

With our late lunch, no one was really needing supper so Lucille and Curtis went in search of potato chips. We had other snacks and drinks to finish off before our flight out in the morning.

The weather still wasn’t all that great as we waited for them to get back and the pool was still closed so I grabbed a couple of “weather” shots.

About my only disappointment (And I wasn’t all that disappointed) with Tenerife was the boring sunsets we saw. I know the storm may have something to do with it but it literally went from light out to dark out with next to no sunset colour. It is just a minor niggle to me because, even with the storm I was really enjoying the island.

It was getting dark when I shot my last photos of the day. (And as it turned out, trip.)

We finished off our snacks and got to bed fairly early because our 5:30 am leaving time would get here soon enough.

It was a bit of a slack walking day and I managed just shy of 7600 steps.

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Canary Islands; day 2

I was going to title this post as Tenerife; Day 2 but we were up well before the crack of dawn on Friday, September 23rd, to drive north to Santa Cruz de Tenerife to catch the ferry to go to Las Palmas de Gran Canaria in search of Hard Rock Cafe shot glasses and beaches.

My brother in law, Curtis, collects the shot glasses from Hard Rock Cafes and Hotels from all the places he’s visited around the world (and he’s visited a lot of places) but he’d never been to the Canary Islands and the opportunity to visit another island nearby was just too tempting not to go.

Seems so calm out there

We had just cleared the entrance to the harbour when it became obvious that it was rougher than it looked out there on the open sea.

The ferry seemed like it was just crawling along and it was pitching and bouncing so walking was a challenge. The crew made it look easy but looking for chairs to grab or a wall to lean on was the only way I could get around easily.

It’s faster than it feels

It seemed less rough at the back of the boat so I stayed on the deck for a bit and took a few shots. Lynda made her way back there for a while too.

She’s smiling now

Our trip over was about 2 and a half hours. We could of taken a 2 hour trip to a different port but it would of involved more driving to where we needed to go. I’m sure with the rough ride, Curtis was re-thinking the port choice.

Ferry going the other way
Hard to keep a level horizon

It had been pretty cloudy on the way over but as we drove to the south side of the island to find the Hard Rock Cafe Rock Shop Gran Canaria the clouds started parting.

At least the sun was shining when we got to the shopping centre as The Rock Shop was closed. We walked around the area checking out stores hoping it would open soon. We’ll take the credit for that working.

After the wait, we found out they are out of shot glasses and suggested going to the Hard Rock Hotel to find some.

I did get myself a tee shirt so at least it wasn’t a total waste of time.

We decided to get some lunch while we were there.

The food was fabulous and I really enjoyed the Tapas.

The bathroom tile was pretty cool

With lunch over, it was time to walk over to the beach.

So many nice flowers growing everywhere

At last, the beach came into view.

I’m not much of a beach guy so I’ve not been to too many of them but even I can recognize a nice beach when I see it. And this was a nice beach.

It was such nice sand to walk on. The black mixed in made the sand patterns change constantly as the water washed over it.

The water seemed cool initially but as I walked along it felt warm. Since I had my camera and was carrying all our stuff, going knee deep was as far as I could go. My bride, on the other hand, had no such restrictions having given me everything but her sandals to carry.

A lack of swimsuit wouldn’t deter my bride from getting a feel for the ocean. Even her hat was wet, but she was enjoying herself.

We started making our way back to the car so we could head over to The Hard Rock Hotel to look for shot glasses there.

It was a short drive east to the hotel and we found a parking spot only a short walk away.

After learning there were no shot glasses here either, we sat and enjoyed a drink before going to check out the nearby beach.

It was a short walk through some sand dunes to another fabulous beach.

I saw why Gran Canaria is noted for it’s beaches. I’ve only been to 2 of them so far and both have been really nice.

I was once again limited to knee depth but my wife and sister had no such restrictions. They figured they were already wet so maybe some body surfing was in order. They never did manage to get the surfing part down but they did manage to get even wetter than they already were.

I was in the ocean too.

It was getting time to go look for some food before we had to catch the ferry back so we walked along the restaurants near the back and decided on Pub Dragon.

We tried a few more Tapas and Curtis had a hotdog.

It was a nice, short walk back to the car.

I saw quite a few cool things along the way but it’s really hard to take photos out the back of a car so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

We got back to the ferry terminal with time to spare and waited patiently for it to come. And waited, and waited.

Finally a ferry pulled in. It wasn’t the company we had come over with and it was an older ship. It looked to be a downgrade from the morning boat.

Finally we were under way.

Just like the mornings trip, the moment we left the harbour it was a rough ride. It was actually rougher than in the morning. (The tropical depression that arrives tomorrow probably had something to do with it.) I’m sure being pitch dark out probably didn’t help the feeling of how rough the crossing was.

We got back to Santa Cruz de Tenerife around 11:00 pm and made our way back to the apartments.

I’m sure there is some cool stuff to see between there and the Costa del Silencio area but both directions of travel on that trip was in the dark so I really have no idea if there is or not.

Our really long day was over around midnight as we got back to the apartment. Just shy of 12k steps today, a lot of them at/near the beach. It was a good day, ferry rides aside.