Right, festival madness is over, I was going to have a rest of some kind yeah? Well what better place than Tenerife, scene of a couple of previous entries involving the volcano at the centre of the island. These days I am fortunate enough to own an apartment there, so, six weeks in the sun it is then. Highlights follow :
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| Back to school for Timmy. |
I do three weeks of Spanish classes, it is really rather fun, my classmates are pleasant company and I make reasonable progress. Fluent I am not but I can just about get by, which is good - I really don't want to be one of those expats who demand the locals speak English to them. There is even a free surf lesson thrown in - I am very bad. Probably should stick to swimming, which also has the advantage of being free.
This is generally a good place to be. Any night I can wander out to one of many nearby bars, generally I head past the little 'Playa Chico' and along the seafront as far as Crab Island, where there is decent live music, and even a disco if you're willing to wait for it to get going (usually around 1am!). Everybody here is on holiday, most of them are having a good time, and it is all rather fun. The huge choice of restaurants means I eat out every other night, rarely more than once at the same place - there is an awful lot of good fresh fish here, but I think my favourite is actually the nearby German place.
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| Signing in for the 'Subida a Tamaimo'. |
One Friday afternoon I come back from school to find the road in front of my apartment has become a carpark for various souped up cars, BMWs, Mitsubishis and indeed fully custom kit car style things. Turns out there is going to be a hill climb event starting in Puerto de Santiago on the Saturday. So I spend much of the next day watching fast cars zoom up the hill, indeed as they do two runs I'm able to watch the start of one, and then walk up the hill in time to see the same cars finishing their second run, in Tamaimo. It is all rather awesome.
This is a paradise for hikers, it has been popular with Germans for years and so the island is criss crossed with well maintained and signposted paths, through a variety of terrain - albeit, almost always up or down steep slopes. From my flat I can walk a little way through the old town of Puerto de Santiago and then up a lava flow to reach the 'camino real', the old road leading up to Tamaimo and Santiago del Teide, and there are various diversions possible from that, for instance to one of many 'Cruz de los Misioneros' on the island, this takes you via a ridge with spectacular views of the sea and nearby La Gomera on one side, and the volcano on the other.
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| Teno. |
Taking the bus further afield - or for one week I have a car, as getting up at 7am so I can take the bus to school becomes a bit trying - there are many more walking options. The famous Barranco del Infierno is now open so I do that, the waterfall at the blind end of the valley is certainly rather cool. I visit the lighthouse at Teno, and walk up from there into the high country, finding goats in shelters carved from the volcanic rock, and indeed goat's milk cheese. The 'Cuevas Negras' route down from Erjos to Los Silos could almost be in England, I pass locals picking blackberries and then walk down a damp path through woods, with lichen-stained limestone walls to either side.
I make it a mission to find a way to walk to Masca from my apartment, turns out there are various ways, but the simplest is just to walk up the camino real to Santiago del Teide and then along the road, while there are a lot of cars, they're more or less going at walking pace on the narrow switchbacks so it is not a problem. It takes around four and a half hours, from Masca I walk down the scenic valley in time to get the boat back. Bit of a shame I manage to fall into one of Tenerife's few ponds and get myself, and worse yet my phone, all wet. Fingers crossed it can be dried out, at time of writing it is all working except the camera.
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| Goat. |
For the future - well, I have also discovered at least five tunnels through the Gigantes cliffs, each around a kilometer long, these were dug in order to channel much needed fresh water to Los Gigantes and the nearby farms. Nowadays you can walk through them, which I tested by walking up to Tamaimo, through a tunnel to a deserted valley, down that as far as the see, up again and through a different tunnel which emerged half way up the cliffs - there followed a somewhat terrifying mile of walking until I got to Los Gigantes. And I reckon that if I got there in time I could walk the other way along the little beach, up a different valley, and then through yet another tunnel to Masca! But that is for another day...
The plan now? Well I have a week back in the UK, among other things for my birthday, then two weeks for a whistlestop tour of South East Asia, and then off to New Zealand. Where my intention is to walk the three thousand kilometre long Te Araroa, which winds from the Northern tip of North Island, right down to the far end of South Island. Watch this space.
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| Up on the caldera wall with El Teide behind me. |
Photos to go with this post can be found here.
