I love Christina’s shop. She started off in the local flea market, selling fancy knitting yarn in the most wonderful colours. I always wanted to buy the lot and spend the next year knitting. Now she has a shop on the Calle Real, still selling the yarn, but also finished knitware and costume jewelry which she makes herself out of local lava and coral, with silver or gold-plated silver…
The flea market in Argual, just outside Los Llanos, takes place every Sunday from about 10 am to about 2 pm. It’s smaller than the monthly market in Santa Cruz, but it’s a much nicer situation. I think it’s been a market square for a very long time. At any rate, it’s surrounded by beautiful old buildings and has trees growing in the middle (which must be really nice…
The big bridge at Los Sauces The new bridge over the barranco at Los Sauces is huge. It’s 319 metres long and towers 150 metres above the valley floor. It opened in December 2004. To begin with, it was rather controversial because it crosses the same valley as the Los Tilos National Park. But you can’t see the bridge from the park, and it’s really rather elegant for something so…
There’s a really simple reason why the Royal Greenwich Observatory moved their telescopes here. It’s one of the three best places in the world for astronomy. The observatory was founded in 1675 by Charles II of England – hence the “royal” for £520 (£20 over budget!). It was the first purpose-built scientific research facility in Britain. At the time, Greenwich was a great place to build it – away…
You see a lot of flags on La Palma. Most English visitors will recognise the flags of Spain and the European Union. But the Canary Islands are an autonomous region within Spain, and they have their own flag too. You see it a lot, especially around May 30th, which is Canary Day. And then each island has its own flag. Here’s the flag of La Palma: And as if…
A long time ago, a young goatherd in Puntallana fell in love. Nothing unusual about that of course, especially since the girl was very beautiful. The trouble was that she didn’t feel the same way. He was tall, handsome and athletic, but she hoped to marry someone richer. After all, a goatherd’s wife worked fourteen hours a day and went hungry in the bad years. But he wouldn’t take “No,”…