Gran Canaria: Towards the West

Gran Canaria has several sensational streets, one of those is the street along the west coast from San Nicholas de Tolentino to Agaete, especially were the is following the impressive coastline.

Till San Nicholas it’s a bit of time, first from Puerto Rico along the south coast till Puerto de Mogán, from there into the heartland and from Mogán crossing to the west.

On the street above several Barrancos a natural spectade is waiting: Los Azulejos

San Nicholas is not so nice it’s situated in a wide valley. The whole area is also called ‘La Aldea’.

On our way north the weather was not so fine, it even started to rain a bit. so we drove strait to the first stop, Agaete

Further to Puerto de las Nieves. The Finger of God can only be admired rudimentarly at the moment. A very strong storm destroyed this rock formation. However, according to our travel guide they plan to rebuild it somehow. In any case Puerto de las Nieves is small but very nice.

Back to the south it became better and it was possible to make some nice pictures of the street:

We made a break in the little harbour of San Nicholas, in Puerto de la Aldea. The little village has become very nice, although it seems as the same storm, which destroyed the Finger of God slammed here too – a part of the small promenade crumbled away and is locked.

In one of the little restaurants we eat fish. Very unhandly this time, the cute little cat under our table is very delighted

It was the restaurant on the right behind, excellent and not to expensive, really recommendable.

Travelogue Slide-in: Sock Parade

To show you some knittings between all those tavelogues

‘The wings of  Horus’ are hibernating at the moment. I downloaded all the clues, but then a pair of socks for a present were needed and then followed  three other pairs. This was also promoted by two visits at the Duemmer Lake and one other in Hamburg – much knitting time for small projects.

For my friend Claudia:

Glitzerregenbogen (Glitterrainbow)
Wollpapst handdyed with Lurex
‘Waving Lace’ from ‘Favorite Socks’

Then I started once again the Versuchskaninchen II (Guinea Pig II) and was able to finish it rapidly. Unfortunatly the pattern shrinks so much, that the socks are better for a small 35/36.

Versuchskaninchen II (Guinea Pig)
Handdyed from Frau Wolle
‘Yarn over Cable’ Charlene Schurch ‘Sensational knitted Socks’

And to pairs of sneaker socks, each from one children strand from the Wolldrachen:

Sonnenfreude (Sun Delight)
‘Woven Stitch’ Charlene Schurch ‘Knitting sensational Socks’

and

Fruehlingserwachen (Spring awakening)
‘Yarn Over Cable’ Charlene Schurch ‘ Knitting sensational Socks’

Besides  ‘Maspalomas’ the following sock projects are now on some needles:

Stripes…

and ‘Firgas’

As the big project I took out the Kimono-Scarf. It will be my mothers birthday at the begining of June and I plan to finished it till then.

Gran Canaria Slide-in: Pozo Izquierdo

One reason for us, to fly to Gran Canaria was Pozo Izquierdo. This village, on English the ‘Left fountain’, is one of the best districts for windsurfers worldwide.

As you may know in between, Arne himself is surfing for a few years and so we were very courious what happens here. To surf himself here was no option for him. You are only surfing here when you are really good.

The wind here is nearly continously strong. It is a good recommendation, to keep even on sunny days a jacket or a bit thicker sweater, if it’s planned to stay here for a while. Sitting is easy here, the ‘beach’ where the surfers enter the water is sourrounded by a kind of atrium. Oh and a hanky for the (sun-) glasses should also not be forgotten.

As I mentioned above, here surf those who are really good. They are streaking over the weaves and waterstarts and turns are for them as easy as breathing. Many of them are simple real good drivers, maybe natives, who have no long way to the water, but with a bit of luck it’s possible to see here windsurfers who drive in the competitions all over the world. Suspicious is always a coloured bus on the car park above (these Topsurfers are often sponsered by car companies and have then very beautifull airbrushed vehicles), with a bit of luck it’s possible to detect a sail with a number on it (sometimes they drive inkognito).

What theses drivers make a bit more worth seeing than the others, many of them are not simply surfing, they train tricks. Salti, turns with the board and other interesting figures, it is really fun to see. We were able to identify six of those drivers (and the nice guy, Arne talked a bit with, was maybe one, too, Surfer are very open people, as I noticed until now), and at home I found a homepage, were it’s possible to find the people to the numbers, in between a German young talent, who lives now on the island (Philip Koester), a Norwegian, who is also famous (Vidar Jensen) and the most succesfull femal surfer at all, Daida Ruano Moreno.

Of course Arne made many beautifull pictures and films, here are some of them:

Gran Canaria – Old Paths

To be precisely, nearly all streets on Gran Canaria are old paths for us, because we drove all of them more or less at earlier visits.

But first another view from our balcony, this time at day.

Below there is roundabout, where the coast street passes. On the right we could also see the bus terminal of the village. We spend a lot of time on our balcony, especially in the evening/night. Puerto Rico seems always busy and a lot of taxis and busses are coming and going. So we had always a lot of fun, watching what was going on.

Back to the trip…

We went on the motorway to Maspalomas and had a bit problems to find the street up to Fataga, as the direct exit exists only on the other lane.

This street is also demanding, but not so narrow. However very fast it’s protracting in often close turns up the barranco (river valley). From the Mirador de Fataga we had a fantastic view over the coast and Maspalomas:

Fataga itself is a very beautiful little village. Unfortunatly we couldn’t drink fresh orange juice here, as the times before, the little premises were closed.

Further to San Bartolomé de Tirajana. The town is very neat. We strolled a bit aroung and after an look on the map we decided how to continue.

We drive in direction sea and came to Santa Lucia de Tirajana. A lot happend here, the center has been constructed new and very nice.

After Santa Lucia comes furthermore the Fortalezza Grande. Here was one of the last refuges of the Guanchen, the canarian natives before the Spanish came. After the legend about 1600 people holed up here. Most of them were persuaded to give up, only two leaders preferred to fall themselves to death. The Guanchen merged fastly in the Spanish new arrivals, as those, if they wanted to stay and get ground on the island, had to be married.

However, many of todays natives don’t feel as Spanish but as Canarians and try, to keep the heir of the Guanchen alive as much as this is possible.

It dragged us to the sea, to Pozo Izquierdo, and further to Playa del Ingles and Maspalomas. There we beheld what happened around the Faro, it was much. As we determined, even here not in a bad way but with a good taste.

Gran Canaria Slide-In: Evenings on the Island

Even when we were a lot on the roads at days, in the evenings we had again to leave the apartment after dinner. The first evening we stayed in the apartment, one evening Arne went alone down to the beach in Puerto Rico, a second time we went together. But usually the question was if we should go to the Faro of Maspalomas or to Puerto de Mogán.

If it drew us to the Faro, we made usually a stroll along the beach (the exception will follow at the end of the respective  daylogue).  Of course we photographed a lot, one picture more beautiful than the other. The first pictures are from several evenings:

In Puerto de Mogán we strolled around the harbour. On day we were early enough to watch also the sunset (mostly we were too late for it). Arne was able to make photos from a very different perspective: He walked on the wall beside the harbour road.

Gran Canaria: A first little trip

So after a very nice flight we landed after ten years again in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. For the first time Arne and I tried the well-tried division of tasks abroad: I was waiting for the suitcases and Arne dealed the procedure with the car rental. It worked fine and again we received an upgrade.

The description to the apartment in Puerto Rico is excellent and we find it directly. In between the Motorway doesn’t end before Arguinegin but after Puerto Rico – we used it very often. Mona, our renter, was waiting for us and a really nice person. The apartment is tall, plain but clean and well furnished. So I would have to think a while, when I had the last time a better furnished holiday kitchen and cooking was real fun and worked fine this time.

The first activity is shopping. In the nearby Shopping Center is a Hyper Dino (there are some more supermarkets, but this one is the most cheapest in the area). But the store is one of the unattracivest one of the range, I ever visited and parking at the center is a real problem. As we have a car and are flexible, we later made our purchases mostly in the Dino in Puerto de Mogán or in the Carrefour in Vecindario.

But at the moment it was good enough to get satisfied and after a short break we started to our first short trip.

A short hint: On Gran Canaria the Streetnumbers changed, someone who wasn’t there for a while should take a look, if the street map is still working

We drive to Soria, there is a reservoir, but it is empty. The continuation is the first adventure. We want to drive a bit more to the heartland, and and turn off in direction Mogán to go down too Puerto de Mogán.

The street has according to the map an official number and is in good conditions. But it is really narrow and oncoming traffic makes Arne very business (and no, it is definetly NO one-way street). At the turning we respire a bit. The street, we are now using, didn’t exist this way ten years ago, parts of it where piste. But know it is fine and we have a nice look down the valley.

Mogán itself didn’t change so much, the one passage in the village is as small as it was ten years ago. In direction Puerto the street passes beautifull little villages, one after another. Puerto de Mogán changed more, but in an acceptable way: The empty square on the left side of the tiver valley is now in crop (here is also the new shopping center with the much better Hyper Dino) till the beach, but it stay reasonable, the houses not too high, abit in the stile of the harbour and with several nice shops. The beautifull harbour stayed as ten years before.

We found a good car park and strolled, before turning back to the apartment over the street along the coast.

Gran Canaria Travelogue

Hello dear readers,

after a busy week and a beautifull Saturday yesterday (we went windsurfing again and were on the road for a long time) the weather today was not so fine, it even rained one time. And what can someone do on such a quiet Sunday? Cheing photos again, choosing, copying, narrowing, add the copyrights (most of them are from me, but there are also some from Arne) and uploading at Photobucket.

And finally as promised starting the travelogue.

Here is the first picture, Arne snapped me in Las Palmas at the Las Canteras Beach sitting on a bench knitting the ‘Maspalomas’ Socks.

And now please follow me to the first part of the travelogue…

It’s not easy…

of course I would love to show you my report, even the first planning exists – but since Tuesday I’m back to work  and in the evenings I’m too weak and now at the weekend the weather is too fine to stay long inside at the PC. But it’s only a pleasure deferred, I promise, and I’m still busy knitting.

Have a nice Sunday
Best regards
Bianca

Holiday-Joy

Hello dear readers,

today was the last day of my first holiday this year (Arne had to work one day on Thursday last week and Friday was a bank holiday, but today he was again off from work). A very pleasant time lies now nearly behind us…

Last Tuesday we came back from Gran Canaria.

When I got to know Arne nearly 17 years ago, our first vacations were in Germany. We often went to the island Sylt (in den North Sea) or visited my aunt and discovered the Harz (German low mountain range) from her home.

Then there came our first vacation by plane to Gran Canaria. Arne visited the island with his mother ten years before. Our first flight was with Lufthansa via Frankfurt and after I overcame the shock about the ugly environment around the airport, I liked the island. Two other visits followed, ten years ago was the last time (after it we changed to Teneriffa and later Lanzarote) and now we decided, that we could visit the island once again and, by the way, ‘digitalise’ it.

After watching the old photo albums the evening before starting, this was urgently neccessary

So we spend ten nice days in Puerto Rico. This is a very touristical bay, but we rented a very nice appartment up the slope and we had a lot of fun watching the whirl below. We made many photos and it’s not easy to choose from them. I made the choice from mine yesterday and will complete them with Arnes and I hope, you will have a lot of fun the next days when I show you the stages of our vacation. Little Warning: On several days there will be many

In my vacation I read and knitted. But I didn’t finished much. The glitterrainbow growed:

In the suitcase was only sock yarn. Between two balls from an older Handgefaerbt summer subscription which I gave names from places on Gran Canaria. I started the ball Maspalomas:

Today I finished this pair. It was fun to knit, but I had to wait till home, as I wasn’t sure how much I had to knit for size 37.

Woodland
Opal (Present from the dear Diana)
‘Baby Cable Rib’ Charlene Schurch ‘Knitting sensational socks’

Here at home I continued ‘Inishmore’:

And I participate at Kalinumbas Riddle-KAL. After vacation I had to start the ‘Wings of Horus’ once again and I’m now in between Clue 2. Here is the picture after the first clue:

I knit with the cone pure cotton I bought at the spring sale of the Hamburger Wollfabrik. I like the colour for the theme very much. The shawl is not easy to knit. The stitches are easy but the arrangement is exceptionally and sometimes it’s not easy to capture the pattern logically and to follow it.

Easterweekend

The easterweekend was really nice. Four days of fantastic weather, a lot of time spended on the balcony, a bit of knitting and, when it was too warm, reading, and not too little.

Of course at days it was too warm for Inishmore. Up to now it was still possible to take it along and so he growed at several meetings and train rides. In between I separated front and back and am working with two balls of yarn at once:

When I was knitting on the balcony, I knitted socks. And so I finished the Rosentau Socks:

Rosentau (Rose Dew)
Designeryarn from Selavi with glitter
‘Laburnum’ Charlene Schurch ‘Sensational knitted Socks’

On Saturday we will fly to Gran Canaria. We are really looking forward to it and very curious. Our first vacations abroad where there but for more than ten years we didn’t visit the island. Now we want to discover with the digital camera.