Sunday photos: Puntagorda

January 24, 2021

I had a double dose of walks this week, one to the old church at Puntagorda and one around La Salemera. I’m not getting noticeably fitter, but I had fun and took lots of photos. I’m reading through “Murder by Starlight” aloud. The friend who recommended this is quite right; you catch a lot of little things that you missed all the other times through. The trouble is, it’s very…

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Sunday photos: hermit crab and sally lightfoot crabs

Sally lightfoot crab, Grapsus adscensionis at La Salemera, Villa de Mazo, Isla de La Palma
August 23, 2020

I went back to La Salemera with my friend and her grandchildren, to find that the tide was put at the rock pool we’d swum in before was now too shallow for swimming. This was a great disappointment to the five year old until we found the hermit crabs. Then, of course, she was fascinated. After some googling I found that they’re Clibanarius erythropus If you haven’t seen hermit crabs,…

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Sunday photos: Sally lightfoot

August 2, 2020

I went to the beach at Salemera with my friend and her grandchildren. We went swimming in a big rock pool – well, sort-of swimming because even the deepest bits were only about half a metre, but it was great fun. Then I noticed something moving on the rocks at the edge of the pool. I pointed at it and told the six-year-old, “Oh look, there’s a red crab over…

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Photos of the week: Corpus Christi

June 4, 2018

Corpus Christi is a Catholic fiesta to celebrate the body of Christ. In Mazo they celebrate by creating big archways and carpets decrated with petals, seeds and leaves. In San Jose they mostly make carpets with coloured sea salt. Rather obligingly, Mazo’s archways go up on Wednesday night and San Jose’s on Saturday night, so it’s much easier to get to both.       Mazo is the more famous…

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El Borrachito

August 22, 2016

It’s all been a bit serious lately, so on Sunday night I went to see the Borrachito fiesta in Hoyo de Mazo. I got a bit more than I bargained for, but I certainly got out of my rut.

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Corpus Christi tomorrow

June 3, 2015

  Tomorrow is Corpus Christi in Mazo. That is, they’ll be making the archways and carpets tonight, and most people will go and see them tomorrow, but they’ll stay up until Sunday night. Also on Sunday they’ll hold a special mass in the church followed by a procession around the archways. The archways will stay up until Sunday. If you miss this, you can see some examples from previous years…

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