My name is Marion Vermazen. I am a traveler, hiker, reader, Sun alumnus, computer geek, YouTuber, Spanish and French language student, knitter, weaver and genealogist.
This afternoon we rented a car and drove up into the center of Gran Canaria. We are staying at the Parador Cruz de Tejeda. It feels like we are at the very top of the island. We have magnificent views in every direction.
View from Parador Cruz de TejedaParador Cruz de Tejeda
This morning we walked to El Corte Inglés department store. They have a post office where we bought stamps and mailed a couple of post cards. Then we went to their restaurant and had a bit of breakfast.
Breakfast in El Corte Inglés
We wanted to have a picnic dinner tonight so we bought food in El Corte Inglés grocery store.
When we arrived at the Parador this was waiting for us in our room.
It’s a beautiful day here on Gran Canaria, a low of 62 and a high of 70. We started out the day by walking along the promenade to the auditorium at the south end.
Along the promenade
Along the way we stopped for pastries and coffee.
Later we saw a churrería and stopped for more coffee and a churro.
Coffee and a churro
We were resting in our room when we heard the children’s parade starting so we went down to watch.
Part of the children’s parade More of the children’s parade
Duke was really looking forward to seeing them mark the end of Carnival by burning the sardine. We found some seats in the bleachers and waited for the parade escorting the sardine to start. It was worth the wait. The end of the parade was the sardine followed by mourners in black.
The sardineThe mourners
We followed the sardine as it headed towards the beach. We were swept along by the crowd and were dumped onto the beach. Eventually the sardine was carried down to the water and loaded onto a barge.
The sardine being carried across the beachThe sardine being towed out from the beach
Eventually they lit the sardine on fire and then the magnificent fire works show started.
The sardine burning and the fireworks startingFireworks
As the fireworks were ending we found our way to an Italian restaurant overlooking the beach and had dinner. The pizza and ravioli were excellent.
Ristorante Pizzería Al MaccaroniAnchovy and olive pizzaShrimp and salmon ravioli
Saturday we took a plane from the island of La Palma to the island of Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands. It was about a one hour flight. Here’s a link to my La Palma video.
Leaving La Palma
We took the bus into Las Palmas de Gran Canaria where we are staying.
The view from our room
The big Carnival parade on Gran Canaria was Saturday night. Our hotel is right next to the parade route.
We stood in one place for a couple of hours watching the people with beautiful elaborate costumes go by. Then came a series of buses and semi trucks with rolling bars and lots of people on and following each one.
We watched a while, then walked around some, then went up to the restaurant at the top of our hotel to have dinner. The parade started around 6 and when we were eating at 10:30 it was still going on!
Cheese board to share as part of our dinnerThe Carnival parade from the restaurant at the top of our hotel
We took an 8 pm ferry Thursday night from the island of La Gomera to the Island of La Palma in the Canaries. With so late a departure we had all day to enjoy La Gomera. It was the clearest day we have had since we arrived. We could easily see Tenerife with the Teide Volcano across the channel.
Tenerife and Teide Volcano from La Gomera
We drove to Playa Santiago, the next town along the coast and had coffee overlooking the beach I tested the water and it seemed relatively warm.
Coffee in Playa SantiagoPlaya Santiago
We stopped at a viewpoint on our way back to San Sebastián. We could see how the trade wind clouds coming from the north east get stopped by the mountains. The sign at the viewpoint said that it is estimated that the volume of water provided by these clouds is five times what the area gets from rain.
Trade wind clouds are stopped by the mountains.
We knew we would arrive at the Parador on La Palma after the dining room closed. The person at the front desk in La Gomero called La Palma and they said they would give us dinner in our room. We didn’t get to the Parador in La Palma until about 11pm but then we had a great dinner.
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