The island of Tenerife had a lot of other interesting towns and landscapes to offer according to our guide next to the capital Santa Cruz. Starting today, we finally had a car for three days and were able to expand our exploration radius significantly.
Unfortunately, in the Canaries, the weather in December is rather changeable and according to weather forecast rain was announced for our first trip to the north of the island. Therefore, we began our journey of exploration in the south and followed the coast road west. Similarly as in Gran Canaria, the south of the island is firmly in the hands of Tourism in the form of many hotel facilities, Restaurants and Bars. So we left the tourist resorts unnoticed and quickly on the left and put only in "Los Gigantes" a break.
Los Gigantes is located in the far west of the island on the edge of the Teno massif. Where the cliffs fall steeply ten kilometers of almost 500 Meters down steeply into the sea. A truly impressive sight. This is also the only port located on the west side of the island. But this is not suitable for boats with depth, because it has a strong tendency to silting. So we would probably stay with our almost two meters draft already in the driveway or anywhere else stuck. For this reason, there were only motor boats with shallow draft and only a handful of local sailing yachts at selected locations. Too bad for us, for here we would like to have inserted a stopover.
We left the coast and wound our way up into the mountains. Between countless banana plantations, the landscape was always greener. Our goal was the place "Masca". A former "Pirate's Nest" and beautifully situated on six hundred meters high in a canyon with sea view.
The town itself consisted of only a handful of houses, but the view in the steep, green valley was a dream. In a small inn we made our lunch break and eating the typical wrinkled and delicious "Canarian potatoes" to a cool Shandy.
For the way back to the port we used the last of the sun and drove up high to the national park "Teide". The Teide is the highest mountain / volcano in the Canary Islands with 3718m height . Here we got before a first impression of the bizarre and impressive landscape of craters with diameter and 17Km from the cool temperatures, in the 3000 Prevail meters high. Not without reason Fiction films were here already shot several Science. For our hiking trips, we will now probably think of appropriate clothing.
On Saturday we were on our way to Porto de la Cruz. But first there was a visit to the Ferriteria (Hardware store) on the agenda, the only two highway exits was removed and was clearly visible from the highway. Since Dietmar had to get only a few things, I decided, to wait in the car and browse a bit in the guide. Keine besonders weise Entscheidung 🙂 Nach über einer Stunde teilte ich meinem geliebten Ehemann per SMS mit, I was now completely but cooked and cooked through and if he would not thaw immediately, this would be an immediate separation principle. A short time later he was beaming beside the car, loaded with a bag full of great things. He would have been only half an hour away, or??? 🙂 Auf meiner Uhr waren es irgendwie fast eineinhalb Stunden 🙂 Zeit ist eben relativ. Especially in a male shopper.
Then we finally go on the island highway in the north of Tenerife. Unfortunately, here, the rain had not yet moved. He probably did not know our weather forcast. Nevertheless, we strolled in a rain break through Porto de la Cruz. The city is apparently firmly in hand by English tourists, where the beautiful old town seemed particularly appealing with typical Canarian houses. We personally liked Santa Cruz something better. But this impression could have caused the unfriendly weather.
Right on the water, we found a great bakery with attached café, in which it not only many different dark breads and tasty cakes, but also gave Christmas cookies and studs. This also of course we could not say "No" and tried some cakes.
Refreshed, we followed the coast then head west to Garachico. In Internet Dietmar had come across a report, the reported positive of a marina in Garachico. Neither in Imray leaders still in its current charts we had been able to find this mysterious port. Now we wanted to look up on the spot times, if was some truth to the story.
Even from the shore road you could see the masts of sailboats clearly and a small road took us directly to the new marina. Modern and well maintained but not yet fully completed, there is a gated community in front of a gigantic high breakwater.
We were not particularly surprised when we have a panel on the harbor edge endeckten, this port as the EU project distinguished. Schade, that he was so far not been marketed better. Nowhere we could not find contact details of the port offices. But we managed with the help of our accumulated knowledge of Spanish and with "hands and feet", to get by the guards the phone number of the harbor master. We want to see once in the course of the next week, under what conditions one can make a stop here. The adjacent city, which is within easy walking distance, We liked that is very good!
To come back to the Marina San Miguel we choose, to take the shortest route via Masca. By now the weather had so suffered, that there was no nice views to enjoy more and the rain drummed violently and loudly on our car window. Also Masca was in this weather deserted. So we had to take the narrow street just before boulders into eight, the wind and rain from the steep slopes spin on the way. Other cars were barely on the go.
On the other side of the mountains was the bad weather will be nothing to see. Even at the port no drop of rain had fallen. On the boat we made ourselves with a nice movie from our video library cozy . Until now we had not met any new sailors in port, with which we were able to spend lovely evenings. A bit went with us to the "winter blues" wide. Therefore, we decided, but to fly over Christmas in Germany and cold to visit our families. Wir hatten Glück und fanden sogar noch einen günstigen Flug 🙂
The next morning the sun was trying to compensate for the weather the last two days and immediately started a "holiday well-being" wide. In Les Galletas at the harbor we had breakfast outside on the terrace of a cafe and bought then still freshly caught tuna directly from fishermen for the evening. After this was safely stowed before the heat on the SUMMER in the refrigerator, we drove back north. We actually want to go to the Teide for hiking today, but still shrouded in thick clouds. In the north, the sun was beaming with steep and overgrown slopes. So we changed our plans very relaxed and were guided by the weather.