Life in the Canaries
Storyteller
Tue 30 Oct 2007 19:39
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First, did anyone manage to open the file with the
photos of our fish etc? We suspect not, so if anyone did, please let us know!
With any luck our Atlantic crossing crew will be more skilful at this than we
are.
The reason for the lack of communication is that
since arriving in Las Palmas I've been working with a Spanish tutor, and doing
my assignments and learning dozens of new tenses, not to mention hundreds of
irregular verbs, has been occupying most of my time--in between socialising with
the increasing number of arrivals for the ARC (Atlantic Cruising
Rally).Lots of the English people have gone back to the UK for 2 or 3
weeks, so we're the recipients of their fridge contents as well as keeping an
eye on their boats for them--and plant minding. Next week we're taking a side
trip to Madeira for a few days--but in a plane.
Before we arrived in Las Palmas we had rather
wondered how we would fill in the 6 weeks before the ARC, but we've found it to
be a delightful city with almost no tourists--they're all down at big
Disney-type resorts in the south of Gran Canaria and on Tenerife which is a well
known 'booze and bonk' destination.
The climate here is near perfect, and we've been
able to join the nearby yacht club which has a lovely pool, a top class
restaurant and wifi, so we're there every day. There's a wonderful market only a
short distance away,and a great cultural scene with concerts, fiestas, folk
singing and dancing. The feel is much more South American than peninsular
Spanish, especially in the music and language.The Australian ambassador was here
this week, and evidently Australia exports palm trees to Las Palmas, which is
like coals to Newcastle.Being just off the coast of Africa, the climate is semi
tropical, with an abundance of mangoes, papayas and avocados, which we devour,
along with the seafood.
The population is very mixed, with many Africans,
Philipinos and Cubans. We're even taking salsa classes with a very
handsome black man. John doesn't seem quite as
excited as I am!
So, it's less than 4 weeks until our departure, and
the list of jobs to be done is becoming a little smaller. Unless something
dramatic happens, I'll blog again after we return from Madeira on 11
November.
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