RadinGranCan

Somehow Friday's post didn't complete. Now fixed but dont worry if you missed it. Nothing much happened. Today is our last full day and the sun comes out to play.  The luxury of a good swim before breakfast has been a big plus here. We spend the morning sorting our belongings and working out how we packed them a month ago. Lunch is a serious effort to clear out the fridge including wonderful stuffed Peppers and Canarian potatoes left over from last night. After lunch we walk down to Maspalomas Creek keeping an eye out for birds. Barely 100 metres out of the resort we spot a small flock of European Greenfinches on the side of the road. On the road along the side of the big storm drain wespot an old friend from India. No leaves, red flowers and blooming at this time of year must make this a cotton tree. Down at the creek there is a small wader that looks familiar but that we cannot identify with confidence. "Take a picture and we will ...

This won't take long. R has been struck down by the lurgy again and has to go back to bed. D remembers that he forgot to write the blog yesterday and has to have two goes at it as there is a malfunction of some type. We run out of Cold & Flu capsules so D has to go to the chemist. It is getting harder to find a different beer each day. D fails to spot that this one is Gluten Free. Does removing the Gluten take the flavour out? They have awarded themselves cinco estrellas but D is only awarding ** The flat tone of the day is reinforced when a message comes from Jet 2 to tell us that our airport transfer will arrive at 11.00 on Monday. Hopefully R will be a bit better tomorrow. No fruit and veg shortages here.

R is greatly improved today and celebrates by flooding the bathroom and bedroom. Luckily the cleaners have started work and we are able to borrow a mop and bucket.  Crisis over we take the shuttle to Playa del Ingles and enjoy a stroll along the front. We enjoy a beer at Los Bucaneros. The less said about the popcorn the better. We continue along the prom and find a place that is doing sardines. Too good a chance to miss. R ups the stakes by ordering sangria. Lunch was excellent. Back at base for the afternoon R does artistic things while D listens to the football which is a bit more satisfactory than last week. We take the shuttle back to PdE and have a drink before dining. D had totally forgotten about beer of the day but a bar we tried helped out by producing this. Doesn't taste of much at all. We are talking ** at best. For supper we return to the tapas place that we enjoyed a couple of weeks back. It's still great...

No, not a typo but the name of a small town towards the north coast that the book suggests. Today's weather forecast is a bit iffy and it is the last day that we will have the car so we decide to go sightseeing. The best way to get there is by motorway up the coast, then cutting the corner to avoid Las Palmas. The forecast showers come to pass and the Smart Car's self activating wipers get a decent workout. When we leave the motorway there is a reasonable road that winds up the side of the valley to Teror. Parking isn't too difficult and we make our way on foot into the town.  A cobbled street overlooked by wooden balconies leads to the town square,  dominated by the Basilica of Our Lady of the Pine Tree, a large church built in honour of a vision of the Virgin Mary perched at the top of a pine tree in the 15th century. Presumably the local vino was pretty good back then. R wishes to visit the museum attached to the church so we go in in ...

Today's plan is another drive up into the mountains for a couple of walks and maybe some birding. Our first target is La Fortaleza, near Santa Lucia. We opt for a different route up into the mountains which turns out to be quite a spectacular drive. We find the turn off and descend from the main road. The circular walk here is short but the terrain rough so we change into walking shoes. It seems strange to be wearing socks. The website lists the total climb on the walk to be 17 metres, not much more than 50 feet, so should be OK even for us elderly types. The blurb that we read does not tell us that the circuit takes us via a cave/tunnel through the rock buttress. It is worth the effort. We drive on and stop at a Mirador overlooking a reservoir which makes it look like it has been a dry winter here. Onwards and upwards into the mountains. We revisit the cafe in Santa Lucia where we had coffee a couple of weeks ago and enjoy coffee aga...

Between being proof read by the editor and being published the post for Tuesday vanished. It was quite a busy day with a visit to the historic town of Aguimes, which shuts on Tuesdays, a drive up the Guayadeque Ravine, beautiful but busy, and a trip to Pico Bandama,  overlooking a 200 metre deep caldera. We saw our first lizard of this trip. And R discovered that this flower she really likes is called a Sow Thistle. On the way home we stopped off at a shopping centre that had an adjacent historic site.

Tonight's beautifully crafted post has disappeared into the ether. There's not much left apart from a joke about teenage Motherwell's favourite beverage and a long gone restaurant. There will be riots in Lanarkshire if they try charging that much.

Today we pick up a car again. D presents himself at the office a few minutes before ten and is dealt with by a blonde youth who alternates between fluent Spanish and Ray Winstone cockerney while answering the phone. "Your not a local then?" chirps D. In immaculate RP he replies "My mother is from London." This time there is no reversing onto the roundabout. The exit from the crowded car park is almost as hairy. The car this time is a four door, automatic Smart Car. For no obvious reason each of the front doors has a badge reading "Passion". We load up and set off westward along the GC 1 motorway. This ends just above Puerto de Mogan and we turn north, back through Mogan and then north west. Between 7 o'clock and 10 o'clock on the coast of Grand Canaria there is no coastal road. The main road zig zags and switchbacks through the mountains without any sea views.  On the way we pass Los Azulejos de Veneguera, where there are st...