Easy days

After three days of driving around we needed a break. On Saturday we made a stroll through the town of Santa Cruz.

There are some interesting houses here...

...museums...

...facades in all colours...

...and some modern buildings. But it is evident that the town was rich in the past and still is.

We ended up in a very pretty park. It is well kept, the plants even have signs with their names. We found ourselves a nice bench and had a brunch we bought in nearby store. Then we strolled through the park.

My favourite spot was a series of ponds with frogs. They were incredibly loud, there was one sitting on almost every leaf.

Bougainville plant of vibrant colour.

There were many different palms as well.

Back in the town we came by this statue and Captain particularly liked the dog.

Plaza de Espania is just across the road from marina, it has a big lake and a waterfall.

On Saturday evening we drove to the nearby mall and did some shopping, especially for the heavy stuff that is difficult to transport without the car. We again stocked up on milk, wine, beer, some canned food and cereals.

On Sunday we visited the local farmers market. It was nice, but very crowded. I think I liked the one in Las Palmas better, but my favourite is still the one in Cadiz.

In the afternoon we made as short drive through the hills on the North. There were some clouds on the top, but not too many.

While these rocks really fascinate me, I can't stop thinking that it is all coming down soon.

We drove through misty laurel forrest.

Once on the other side of hills we took the different road than before. This is a small village of Las Bodegas.

We drove to the village of Chamorga, where the road ends. There is a hiking trail towards the East end of the island which we took. I liked this fresh cactus growing from the root.

There were some interesting rocks here as well.

Captain climbed to the holes above the path to see if anybody was living in them. Nobody was home.

The village of Chamorga from the trail.

I found these flowers pretty.

The trail was quite steep, with rope to hold on to and stairs at some point. But it was not dangerous.

It led to this next hill where there are some old houses. We decided it was enough walking and turned back, it was getting late.

We found some more flowers along the way...

...and a bush overgrown with lichen.

Returning to Chamorga we were discussing wether to have a drink and maybe a bite in the local restaurant, but it was already closed when we got to it, so the dilemma was solved.

So we drove back to our boat, it was almost dark when we got there.

It was a nice hike and a nice drive through the hills. After a hot shower and a dinner we started to make plans where to drive to the next day.

The tour around the island

On Friday morning we studied the map of Tenerife and came up with a plan for a road trip on roads where we haven't driven yet. We decided to drive along the North coast of the island as far West as we can, then down along the West coast and then along the South coats back towards our marina. Our first stop was the small town of Garachico. We read about how pretty and unlucky the town is. It was the most important and wealthiest port in Tenerife until 1706, when Montana Negra erupted and the lava erased most of the town. Lava also filled most of the natural port in front of the town, but at the same time created unusual natural swimming pools. The pools were really interesting, I guess they are open for swimming only in summer and we couldn't walk around it.

But it looked nice and I'm sure there's lots of people here on these rocks when the weather is hot and the sea a bit warmer.

This is one of the buildings that escaped lava.

And these are remains of the old town doors, now located in the park.

There is still plenty of pretty buildings, built after the eruption. But after it the town never regained the status that it had before. Which in my eyes might not be such a loss, because it retained it's charm and it is one of very few towns in Tenerife that is not surrounded by concrete jungle of tourist developments.

A smaller bay of what once was a big and important port is still there. On the slope you can see where the lava came down to the tow and the port.

It's not just pretty, but we also had the best ice cream in Spain here.

From Garachico we drove West to the town of Buenavista del Norte. We tried to get to the most NW point of the island, but the road was closed for everyone except busses and organised tours from 10 in the morning til 7 in the evening. Apparently there are not enough parking spaces at the end of the road for everyone that want to drive there. So we turned South and drove into the hills. I'm not sure if this hill is falling apart because of the erosion or is this man made.

We stopped on one of the miradors. While it wasn't very high, only about 1000m, it was cold and misty. The visibility was also not the best, but I guess the mist helps all those plants to grow.

These looked like some sort of giant mountain dandelions.

Next we drove to the village of Masca. Above the village there are some nice mountains.

The plant in the front of the photo looked like some sort of anise or dill plant.

We parked our car above the village and walked down. The village is built on the ridge above the gorge. This is a small square with big tree in the upper part of village.

This is the view of the rest of the village. It is very pretty and luckily we were there rather late in the afternoon when most of the tourists were already gone. It is very popular tourist attraction, mentioned in every guide or top 10 list.

We strolled down into the village through narrow steep streets. I discovered some pretty flowers.

After a walk around we ended in a restaurant and this was the view from our table.

And this...

And on top of everything, the food was delicious. It really is a pretty place, surprisingly cam and tranquil. The almond trees were in bloom and full of bees.

I was surprised that we also found a mango tree...

...and an avocado tree.

Maybe this is where the avocados for our meal came from, it said on the menu "avocados from our garden".

We continued our drive towards South through the hills. You can see the road on the slope of the hill in the cloud.

I'm not sure what this is, but it was very pretty.

Some more rocks from along the road...

Our next stop was the resort town of Los Gigantes, named by the cliffs of the same name to the North of the town. There is also a marina there. We only stopped in mirador little above the town for couple of minutes, since it was getting late and we still had a long way home. Maybe we'll have a closer look at some other time.