Advertisement
Published: July 11th 2004
Edit Blog Post
Sunday 20 th June Day 15: I wake with anticipation, but also with some stress. Will my
wife and
four year old make it on time, or will I spend the day at the airport trying to figure out where they are? Their flight goes from Cape Town to Joburg then on to Madrid, where there is a four hour wait before catching their connection to Tenerife. That's a lot of flying. Waking at 8.00 AM, I still don't leave the apartment before 9.00 and even though I drive at speeds well in excess of the posted 120 KMH limit, I manage to miss the turnoff for the north airport. By the time I arrive at the airport I'm a nervous wreck, remembering my wife telling me, “you better be there when we arrive”, however everything turns out OK. Even though we have to wait an hour for the baggage, I figure it's a good deal. The rest of the day is pretty hectic because I've planned an expedition up Mt. Teide, third largest volcano in the world, but before we get to Teide my wife spots a Picasso exhibition going on in an old castle at Santa Cruz, so we stop off there first. Mt Teide is next but we have to drive up a lot of little windy roads where locals are parading around in their national costume so it must have been some kind of holiday, or do they always do this for Sunday lunch? In any event, Carla and Ariel are suitably impressed, and I'm just grateful for everything. In a background window, I'm amazed at their stamina, having just come off an 18 hour flight, complete with the usual selection of delays and drama. I can't perform after losing a night's sleep, so I keep it in mind that they may drop off at any time. Every second is precious, but I already know this.
Teide? Well, awesome is a word much misused but if I use it in context with Teide you'll appreciate what the word really means. This also lets me off writing about what it's like to be ferried by
cable car to over 13,000 ft., within 150 metres of the summit, or what it was like
driving through the crater. Here are
some of the pix I took because there's too much going down to keep up. Yes,
time is always in the present and this is why I'm writing this the following day, after being out on the water from 10.30 AM till 4.00 PM . To put it mildly, I am somewhat sunburned!
Monday 21 st June Day 16: Like I said ‘yesterday', I've just returned from the
cliffs on the north side of Tenerife. Again, the word ‘awesome' is applicable. I confess to blowing a wad of cash by
chartering my own boat from
Ken, a Finnish guy I met through a Dutch booking company just down the road at the Cólon Harbour waterfront. I'm happy to sail with someone from Finland. I respect Scandinavians because of the fact that, approximately a hundred thousand years ago during the coastal migration, they were the humans who got the furthest North. The boat is a 37 footer powered by twin 6 cylinder 200 hp Volvo penta diesels and we head out after a breakfast of eggs on toast ready for whatever. We spend a short time looking for dolphins and whales, but because I've seen many dolphins and whales back in the waters off Cape Town, I ask the skipper to head for
Los Gigantos, spectacular cliffs, 40 minutes by sea North of the harbour. We are not disappointed by Los Gigantos and I recommend this as a must for any of you who are potential visitors to this
magic island.
This place is like Hawaii, or somewhere in the South Pacific, only
more sophisticated. and we spend most of the day aboard the ‘Jenene' hanging out under the spectacular cliffs where our skipper, Ken, makes us a great salad, served with fresh bread and Tenerife champagne. He doesn't appear to be in a rush to get back to the overweight and tattooed beer drinking English tourists, which is not surprising as they can be quite scary. He tells us that he's had charters from gits who got up to the flying bridge then got too drunk to climb back down the ladder. I spend most of the
way back sitting on the prow with my feet kissed by the water. What a
great day! For supper we drive back to Los Gigantos because I'm totally fascinated by the sheer cliffs. The tomato soup at the restaurant right next to the harbour is worth mentioning, as is the incredible
sunset.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.171s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 13; qc: 57; dbt: 0.1095s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
anonymous
non-member comment
Cool pix
The pix are great. Keep 'em coming!