Tuesday 31st January - El gato bebe la piscina

It's a good job that we are not hankering after a lie in. Our 'bungalow' is close to the cleaners' compound and they start to congregate before 09.00 chattering cheerfully. They aren't the only congregation. There are cats everywhere and they are not fussy about what they drink. Today's forecast is Sunny intervals and 20°C.

The plan is to find a proper supermarket and vittle up for a day or two. A review of Google Maps suggests that we can walk up the road outside the digs and pick up a path to a likely spot. We get to the alleged path to find it to be a security fenced building site. Bum!

We retrace our steps and notice that people are heading across a vacant site towards the road that we need to be on. This site has lots of scrubby bushes and a few trees as well as loads of birds.

The reason for this trip to Gran Canaria was the realisation that Madeira is not the greatest birding venue. The Serious Birding Guide to Macaronesia went with us to Madeira a year ago and most pages told us that many more birds could be found on Gran Canaria. So here we are. Our detour across the vacant site produced a major plus on the spotting front. There were a group of red-billed Common Waxwings in the bushes and in the scrub below a couple of Hoopoes, one of R's favourites.

The short cut takes us where we need to be and el supermercado is'nae too bad. Big difference is the lack of fresh meat or poultry - it's all frozen. We get what we need for tonight and more. On the way home we discover an even better shortcut and sneak in through the cleaners compound to save ourselves 400 metres.After lunch we avail ourselves of the gratis shuttle bus to the centre of Maspalomas. This drops us off right by the Nature Reserve where R spots another favourite, Spoonbills, as well as some smaller waders.

We walk the trail through the sand dunes, quite unexpected on a small island. At times this is hard work as the sand gives way underfoot. As we progress the sun starts to appear but it doesn't get too hot. We take a bus towards home and only have about 400 metres to walk.

Tonight's chicken had thawed out beautifully and the chef has great plans. However, as we all know, a chef is only as good as their brigade.

No need to say it but the Aroz con Pollo was magnifico.