Gran Canaria, January 2018
I have always known about Gran Canaria – the place to
visit for a relaxing sun-beach holiday. I wanted to escape the dark, cold
weather in January and take a sun-beach holiday. I found Gran Canaria the place
to visit in the cold, dark time of the year. The country island has only two
days of rain in a year. Given the cheap prices and the weather I booked a trip
to Gran Canaria.
Day 1 – Saturday – Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
I was travelling alone to Gran Canaria – I needed some
sun and time to relax. A young mountain biker was sitting next to my right side
and a retired old lady to my left side, both were Irish. All of us were heading
to different areas in Gran Canaria. I was heading north to Las Palmas, the old lady
was heading south to Maspalomas and the mountain biker was heading center to
the hills. The Irish man was apparently a professional mountain biker who got
injured and was recovering from his injury. He was going to meet one of his
mates in the island to train for a week. We ended up talking until he had to
claim his luggage and we said our goodbyes. I was only allowed to pay for single
bus tickets. It was about one hour bus drive from the airport to the Big Fish hostel
– the hostel staff were young, friendly foreigners.
I arrived quite late and took a stroll around the
area, I found more locals than tourists. It made me think of the old lady in
the plane – all the tourists are probably in the south. The city had a couple of restaurants that served kebab and supermarkets such as SuperDino and Supervalu. I went walked along the coast and when I reached the very end of the beach, I found a local bar called Nono. I was told they had cheap, good food. I have never tasted calamari
before – I’m not a big fan of squid. I asked what the waiter
recommended and he mentioned calamari. I ended up trying it for the first time.
I had a medium plate of calamari and some bread – it didn’t look pleasant when
I got it and unfortunately it didn’t have the best taste either.
I went back to the hostel and became friends with
Sany, a German girl that was about five years older than me. She had inherited
some money from her grandmother’s will to buy a car but choose instead to
travel with the money. She had already been in the hostel three days before me
and recommended a couple of things that was arranged with the hostel. On Friday
nights, they would arrange a tapas night. On Thursdays, you could book a guided
tour up in the hills followed with wine tasting. Also, she told me it was
raining and there were strong winds during her stay but she was told it
wouldn’t get worse than that since those days were the coldest days in Gran
Canaria. I was quite lucky to arrive when the sun was shining.
There would be a marathon tomorrow called Cajasiete
Gran Canaria Marathon, it had a route along the coast, hence some areas would
be blocked. I wanted to see the marathon in the morning and swim and explore
the south. Sany was heading that direction tomorrow since she wanted to see the
famous chair on the cliff and it was warmer in the south – it was about
2degrees warmer. Therefore, we planned to go there together.
Day 2 – Sunday – South Gran Canaria
Sany and I took a bus and got off at the very last
stop which was Puerto de Mogán. We strolled around, and found a
handful of shops. The shop that I found fascinating was the Aloe Vera shop. The
staff sold both plants and medicines and were very skilled in the different
types of the plant. We went to the beach and enjoyed the sun and the ocean. Some
people were snorkeling.
We went to
the very end of the cliffs and found an abandon chair – what clever person
decided to put a chair on the cliff? That chair must be renowned as numerous
people were standing in line to take photos with the chair. We found a
restaurant called Resturante Playa de Mogán, just around the corner and ordered
fish paella and wine. The waiter told us we had to wait about 45 min for our
fish paella and we asked if we could pay now and then come back. We tried to
understand the reason for the long waiting time and his explanation was that it
was the last fish paella – I still don’t get it. We took a walk and randomly
met some people from the hostel– talk about a small island. Apparently, they
were working both in the Maspalomas and Las Palmas hostel. We went back for our
food and it was worth the wait – the combination of rise, salmon, squid,
mussels, shrimps and fruits was incredible. We headed back to the beach and had
a final swim before we had some candy. I suggested the idea of walking along
the south coast and catch the last bus – I’m glad she agreed.
We took the
bus to Amadores and then walked to Puerto Rico where I took a night swim. I was
literally the only person in the ocean. However, there was only us and three
other people on the beach. We continued our journey and had to take a turn from
the coast. We ended up passing a mountain in the dark, it was about seven in
the evening. Except from the person living in a cave, it was dead silence. The
cave person had a torch on his head and was reading a book. Every time we
talked he would turn to our direction and gaze. The path was hard to see, hence
we used the torch in our phones. By margin we noticed the deep dark hole next
to the path. One wrong step and we would have fallen about 100m down and
probably have died. After surviving the turn, we had to cross the highway and
pass through a hotel to get back to the coast again. Just before reaching del
Mar, we discovered a pleasant, romantic park with a small pond. It reminded me
of the parks in China. We reached the beach and not far from there, was a show
with smoke, dance and music. We didn’t stay too long since we had a bus to
catch.
We reached Arguineguin Center just one minute before the last bus was
scheduled to arrive. We waited more than ten minutes – did we miss the bus? We
were about to leave to find a cab when suddenly, a drunk middle-aged man came
out of nowhere, approaching us saying “no bus”. Sany continued talking to him
and just when we were about to leave for the second time, the last bus arrived
– I must say we were quite lucky.
Day 3 – Monday – North Gran Canaria
Sany and I
bought some breakfast and snacks from Supervalu and went to the beach. We just
wanted to relax, swim and explore the north. Sany mentioned she was heading back at night but wasn’t sure how because the buses
stop running at night time. We tried to find the best solution – she decided to
take a cab to San Telmo and then a bus to the airport. I mentioned I wanted to
experience the mountains in broad daylight and was planning to head to the
botanical garden and Bandama tomorrow. She had been to the botanical garden but
not Bandama. A guy overheard our conversation and asked what we were planning.
Chris was interested in going there as well and we changed information. He was
from Czech Republic and had moved to Las Palmas for an Erasmus exchange. He was
busy attending water courses and finding a place to rent. He had signed up for
a surfing course and had to leave.
Sany and I
were enjoying the sun in the beach when a Polish guy approached us. He had
snorkeling equipment with him. Sany talked to him while I didn’t even bother opening
my eyes, they were talking about snorkeling and he even wanted to lend her his
snorkeling equipment but she declined. He left his stuff nearby and went to
snorkel. Sany and I walked further down the beach and found all the retired
tourists. I would easily say most of the retired tourists were from Germany and
Sweden. We headed back to the hostel and changed for the evening. We walked
along the coast found a group of people still surfing. We then found Alfredo
Kraus Hall, a concert hall with amazing architecture. Just across to the
concert hall was Centro Comercial Las Arenas, one of the bigger malls in Las
Palmas. We continued further down and found some closed restaurants.
Apparently, all the restaurants are open one hour for lunch and then closes
again and doesn’t open until seven in the evening.
We walked
back towards the hostel and found a couple of Italian restaurants. We choose a
restaurant randomly because we were starving. The waiter was a local from Las
Palmas, he asked us where we were from and then started to speak some Swedish.
Apparently, the owner was Swedish – I would guess most of the restaurants were
owned by Swedes or Germans. We sat in the outdoor serving and later asked for
some blankets, but they didn’t have any. The menu had pictures of the food and
was also written in different European languages. We ordered some pizza, I
don’t recall what the name of the pizza was but it was topped with everything
meat, ham and shrimp. Even though the food wasn’t tasty, the staff were lovely
and after we paid, the waiter gave us a sweet apple drink on the house.
Day 4 – Tuesday – Center Gran Canaria
I woke up quite early and went to buy some breakfast
and candy. I texted Chris to see if he was awake and wanted to meet earlier
outside the hostel. He was fine with that but needed to find a place to change
currency. We met and I explained to him that he just had to withdraw money from
an ATM and he would get euros. He was surprised over this method since he
believed he would have gotten Czech koruna.
We went to the bus station and took
the bus to Jardin Botanico Viera y Clavijo. The scenery looked painted and the
plants were colourful. To be honest, I didn’t believe such nature existed in
Gran Canaria. We took the path to the right and had the view of a viaduct. We
took the small stone steps down and reached the botanical garden. There were
many colorful Aloe Vera plants and flowers. We even found a small waterfall and
turtles swimming in some of the ponds. I would describe Jardin Botanico Viera y
Clavijo as a tropical maze. We passed a couple of guided tours in Finnish. We
walked for a while until we found a bench close to one of the ponds with the golden
fishes jumping out of the water, trying to reach the sky. Chris had Spanish
chorizo in his bag and I had leftover bread from breakfast. We ended up having
sandwiches while enjoying the company of the fishes. We occasionally tossed
some bread to the fishes. We went back and took the small stone stairs back up
to the hill. At some point Chris climbed a tree like a monkey, because I dared
him, I told him a funny story about my fearless sister doing it all the time as
a child.
We headed to the bus stop, we had missed the bus and
next one would arrive in 30min. We were short with time, since I had a flight
to catch in the evening and Chris had a Kayak lesson and then a viewing. Chris
suggested we would try to hitchhike. I had never done it before and would
probably never do it alone. He had done it once before and was excited to do it
once more. We tried for a while with no luck. We looked at the signs and
thought maybe it is because they can choose two different paths. We crossed the
highway and found us in the verge with only one direction, to Caldera de
Bandama. The first car passing by was an ambulance, a lady was sitting in the
next car. The lady couldn’t speak English, but Chris knew some Spanish and used
his skills to make conversation. She was happy to take us halfway to our
direction. We walked a bit to get to the top, on our way we found the bus stop
and took some photos on the time table. We reached the top, 569m.a.s.l. - it
was breath taking to see the volcano crater and rest of Gran Canaria.
We went back to the hostel and took a short swim in
the ocean before I had to take the bus to the airport. I was wondering when
Chris was leaving for his course and viewing and he said he decided not to go since
he enjoyed my company and wanted to stay with me until I left to the airport.
He followed me to the bus stop, I gave him a hug and we said our goodbyes.