Since yesterday and tomorrow are public holidays, my son had the day off school today. Since it’s Friday, Helen and Theresa would be coming to Santa Cruz for a Spanish lesson, and visiting me afterwards. Meanwhile Lou would be stuck alone at home with her foot in plaster and a toddler. Cue for barbecue. And then we found Lou’s partner had the day off too, even though he hadn’t been…
Tomorrow is Fiesta de la Cruz — The Festival of the Cross. Like many Catholic places, La Palma has a great many roadside crosses. Tonight, practically all the ones in Santa Cruz, Breña Baja and Breña Alta will be decorated, most of them gorgeously. Since most of the crosses are hung with jewelry, the people who worked on them sit close all night, usually making a party of it ans…
San Jose has a ruined manor house, dating from something like the C16th. I don’t know the building’s history, but the island has lots of old manor houses left from the days when sugar cane made the island was rich. I’ve always dreamed of one day being filthy rich enough to buy it and restore it, because it must have been gorgeous once. It’s no bigger than my modern house,…
San Jose has a ruined manor house, dating from something like the C16th. I’ve always dreamed of one day being filthy rich enough to buy it and restore it, because it must have been gorgeous once. It had carved balconies and wooden ceilings. For some time it’s been empty and far too dilapidated to live in. I heard that the owners couldn’t get planning permission to fix it, so it…
Crater of St Antony’s Volcano. You can see people on the skyline at the right. The most recent eruption in the Canary Islands was Teneguía, in 1971 (see Thursday, 21 February 2008 Which Planet Are You On?). It’s a nice place to visit, but you have to be fairly fit. St. Antony’s Volcano (Volcan San Antonio) is nice in a completely different way. For one thing, it looks like a…
We have the calmina – the wind off the Sahara again. This used to only happen a couple of times a summer, but for the last five years or so it’s been happening more frequently, and over more of the year. We even had calima in January this year. To be honest, that was rather nice for everyone except the farmers. We don’t often swim in the sea in the…