Los Indianos, Santa Cruz de la Palma Tuesday 16thSanta Cruz de la Palma5 pm Fancy dress ball in the senior citizens day centre, with live salsa music Los LlanosCancelled Wednesday 17thSanta Cruz de la Palma11 am Presentation of prizes in the town hall. Los Llanos11 am – 1 pm Children’s activities, Plaza de España8 pm Murgas, Plaza de España Cancajos8 pm the Octopus’s Funeral followed by a dance Thursday 18thLos…
Puntagorda fiesta: almond blossom La Palma isn’t a big island, but it still takes almost 2 hours to drive from Breña Baja to Puntagorda. I found most of the blossom had been spoiled by the bad weather last week, but it was still pretty. (In a good year, the whole hillside turns pink.) Then I got sidetracked into visiting a friend’s barbecue, and very nice, too. I finally got to…
The 19th century butcher’s shop, Breña Baja, La Palma The old butcher’s shop stands on the outskirts of the village of San Jose, in Breña Baja, near the Paradorof La Palma. The building dates from the late 19th century, and it was a butcher’s shop until the 1960s. But now it’s been renovated as a craft exhibition and shop. The famous cigars of The Breñas Although the place is small,…
Some people think it never rains in La Palma. Well, it’s the greenest of the Canary Islands for a very simple reason. And right now, it’s busy getting greener. In fact, we have an official orange weather alert, and all school is cancelled for tomorrow, for the whole archipelago. The thing is, it’s not raining all that much, at last not here. It’s just like a wet day in Wales….
M100 (NGC 4321), a barred galaxy in the Virgo cluster 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. A modern telescope could see the equivalent of a candle on the moon, so obviously they want to be well away from city lights. Even more obviously, they want to be somewhere that doesn’t…
Almond blossom in Garafia The north-west of the island is home to great many almond trees, and at this time of the year, they’re all blossoming. The trees in El Paso and Garafía are beautiful, but the best display of all is at Puntagorda. In fact Puntagorda hosts an annual almond blossom fiesta. The date varies — the Town Hall sets it a couple of weeks in advance, to (hopefully)…