Gran Canaria Wednesday 15 July
We decide to explore the North side of the island. We drive to The Caldera de Bandama which is a volcanic crater - ie insteadd of making a hill with the lava coming out, the whole thing exploded and produced a bloody great hole. The volcano has the notable reputation of being one of the few volcanic craters where people (or a person) has actually been farming for may years. Does this mean that he owns the land? - I have no idea. There is a hill next to the crater with a winding road leading up to a church. At the bottom, we finally discover the entrance to the crater. The walk down is hot, stony and arduous but there is some relief at the bottom with a few trees. The ruins of the old farm house are evident and we take a look around before heading back up to the top. Not as impressive as El Tiede, but certainly a memorable experience. I find it interesting that an island that seems to be infested with thousands of tourists has so few people enjoying one of its more meaningful sights.
We have lunch at the top under some trees and then go to the restaurant overlooking the valley. Not cheap - beers clock in at 35E a pop.
Next stop is Terror. There is a winding road (are you surprised?) through some beautiful countryside to get to this old town known as the village of balconies. We arrive in the town and there is a large crowd in the main hall and the church is clearly occupied. It turns out that there is a funeral in progress. It appears that it is a well know corpse as there are a lot of very impressive flowers and wreaths from large companies. We check out the curio shops (kids desparate to buy some curios as we have only a couple of days left) and wander through the cobbled streets of the town.
A little while later the funeral is over and we wander round the large church in the middle of the town. Here, we feel that we are in a truely spanish town (with the possible exception of the curio shops!) with old men showing their respects by standing outside the pub during the funeral procession and then going straight back in as it is over!
Then back to resort for a swim in the pool as the beach is a long way away - then some table tennis and supper.
Gran Canaria Tuesday 14 July
The only way to get around Gran Canaria and see anything is by car. I am a little disappointed in the lack of tourist information available. It is only when we hire the car that we finally get a decent map of the island. Even the resort doesn't sell them. In Tenerife there was a choice of numerous different free maps. Similarly, it is a real mission to find out what there is to see. There's a bit of info on the internet but most of it discusses the fantastic beaches and the great night life.
We head NE along the highway and with some difficulty find our way toMaspalomas (which is a pretty big town with very few signpost of any use). We finally find the area where there will be dunes and camels (yes, camels). Fiona finds a a parking spot only to be (almost literally) attacked by a man who claims that it is his and he should give it to him. I bravely come to her defence and learly have a fight with him as he threatens to tear off our ariel and I threaten to kick in his rear lights. Eventually he goes away and we wander off to find the dunes. The area used to be some sort of park, but that part of it is now closed. There are no signs (did I mention that?) but eventually we find the dunes and camels. The 'camel safari' turns out to be pretty arb. Basically a crowd of people get on to camels to be lead about 2kms and return. 50E seems a lot for for this type of excitement, so we just look at the camels and walk along a couple of the dunes. Maby someone should try this along the West Coast of Cape Town. Certainly the surroundings would be more attactive! You guessed it, we aren't impressed by the camel safaris.
So we set off up the first road we find in to the mountains. We wind our way up to Avagaures where there is a very impressive dam (well I was impressed anyway!) We can walk down to the dam and across the wall. The wall isn't holding up much water, so we can even walk on to the spillway. Very few people around. I guess they are all on the beach! We have lunch by the dam wall and then walk back up to the town and enjoy a beer and cokes (our daily treat).
There is still a few hours of the afternoon so we head up another slightly less windy road to Montana de Tauro. Once again the views are magnificent and we return via Puerto De Morgan wich is NW of Playa de los Amadores and then take the coast road back to the resort. On the way we stop at a little beach and decide that this where we will have our paella (Maria's). The kids then spend a couple of hours on the water toys after which we return to a restaurant that we had seen on the way back from Purerto de Morgan.
The kids have excellent value steaks and we have seafood.
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