After our “strenuous” day on Wednesday we had a day of rest spent pottering about with a few hours on the beach which is about all I can stand. Picture above, notice the blue skies, it is about 22c, I understand this is a little different to Shropshire at the moment.
We did manage another meal in our favourite restaurant and have made bookings there for Friday and next Tuesday evenings. Last night there were 10 of us eating at almost the same time so once were all seated and had been given drinks which of course meant Carmen, the owner waitress, touched each of us in turn she then delivered a little speech in Spanish, German and English to explain “what was possible” in other words the evenings menu. As before there are no prices, she recommends the wine to have and everything is delicious. If two people at the same table order the same food a double portion is delivered and you sort out sharing it between you. When the bill comes you are always pleasantly surprised. Some things seem free which makes a change, the bread and the amuse bouche for example and when I asked for grappa to finish she just left the bottle on the table, I have no idea if I was charged for it and after a couple of glasses I didn’t care.
If Carmen, were to catch covid then La Palma would be in trouble, she touches every customer several times in the course of delivering the food so in the space of five days, before she realised she had the virus well over 100 people will have been infected. Currently the number of infections per 100,000 people over 7 days in La Palma is three, La Gomera is now at zero, Shropshire is at 431, we do feel a little safer here.
Our apartment is quite nice, all the fittings are top of the range and nothing comes from that den of iniquity, IKEA, who seem to have supplied every cup, saucer, utensil and most of the furniture in everywhere else we have stayed. In the courtyard it has an ice well, in the days before refrigeration ice was brought down the mountain at night (so it did not melt) and was packed into the well as a reservoir of ice, much like the ice caves you get in country houses in the UK.
Unfortunately this is no long in use, there is no facility to make ice in our fridge so our pre dinner G&T’s are not quite perfect.
We did have one sleepless night, the streets are cobbled and once a year the council come along and power wash all the muck out of them AT NIGHT!!! 3am – 5am to be precise. I don’t think we have ever encountered as many street cleaners / litter pickers anywhere else in the world as here in the Canaries. Not just in the city centre or tourist areas, every town seems to have gangs of street cleaners, no idea how it is paid for but it is certainly welcome.
After our rest day we decided to go mountain biking and thought we ought to get some expert help so booked with a company on their “Easy” trip.
As there are no other tourists we had our own guide who was very good, chatting away the whole time telling us about the island whilst leading us along quiet roads and tracks. The bikes were amazing, we climbed up to just below El Pilar in the mountains without difficulty, blasted down the access road and then climbed another long hill to La Cumbrecita, a spectacular crater.
In all we climbed about 4500ft and rode 22 miles in four and a half hours. Leaving the car park at the top there was a car about to pull out which Gill and I were going to let through, the guide said no go first as we will be faster than a car and he was right – amazing speed for old people like us it was a great day out, Gill was chuffed as I had almost used all my battery power but she still had quite a bit left. Despite what it appears in the picture we did have a bike each