On our second day in the Canaries, we approached the port of Arrecife on Lanzarote. We were tied up in the half-light, so, there was no chance of any early morning surveying. There weren't any Birds I was keen to look for on the island and therefore, my plan was to book onto one of the ship organised coach tours.
Sandwich Tern: Chris and I were watching Arrecife's bay from the cabin's balcony and suggesting potential species we might see. Top of the list was Sandwich Tern and within five minutes, there were half a dozen flying around the bay
The wreck of the Telamon: Back in 1981, she started flooding on a trip from Ivory Coast to Thessaloniki with a cargo of logs. She was beached by the port and the fuel oil and logs were offloaded. After breaking her back in a storm, she could no longer go to sea. In recent years, she has been partially dismantled, but that work stopped a couple of years ago. Conveniently, the Greek company who owned her no longer exists and so won't have to pay for the clean up
Fortunately, there was room on one of the coach tours around the island. The first stop was the delightful small tourist town of Teguise, which was the capital of Lanzarote from the early 15th Century until the capital moved to Arrecife in 1852. As we were travelling around the island, our guide said that there was a famous artist, Cesar Manrique, who lives on the island until his death in 1992. He worked hard to convince the locals to paint their houses while to revive an old tradition on the island. As these photos show he was very successful in this regard.
The small tourist town of Teguise
The old church was at the centre of Teguise
The square around the old church
Another view of the square
The buildings have a very Moorish look to them: This isn't surprising as while the Canaries were first mentioned by the Romans, they were first settled by Moors from 999 AD. In the early 14th Century, a Portuguese ship captained by Genoese navigator Lancelotto Malocello arrived. Within a few years, the locals were being captured and sold into Spanish slavery. The Spanish started to settle in the Canaries from the start of the 15th Century. Early settlers continued with the building styles of the first inhabitants as the houses were easy to build, with flat roofs which were designed to channel water into underground storage
This old 15th Century church tithe barn is now the local bank
The bank has retained many of the old structural features of the building
I really like how many of the building stones stand out from the lime mortar: Cacti and Succulents were often replacing more typical garden plants on the island
A statue celebrating the local musical style of dancing with a tambourine
Collared Dove: This was one of the Bird species around the town
Santa Barbara Castle dominated the hill next to the town: This started as a simple 15th Century watch tower, but it was converted into a proper fortress by 1576
Having had a good wander around the town, it was time to move on. The next stop was the beach next to the surfing beach village of Caleta de Famara, which had excellent views of bumpy sand dunes and some stunning hills. It was little more than a quick photo stop, but there was time to look around the village and photograph a couple of Spanish Sparrows I had seen.
A nice looking cafe: Everything in the village seem to be surfing related with a surf school, surf shop, surfing hotel and this cafe which presumably welcomes surfers
There were a few hardy surfers in the waves next to the village
There were these little hummock dunes behind the beach
Spanish Sparrow: Male. The is the nominate hispaniolensis subspecies which occurs in Cape Verde, the Canaries, Madeira, Southern Europe & North Africa
All too soon we were back on the coach to head to the Southern end of the island.
Wherever you go on Lanzarote, there are these small volcanic hills
Monumento al Campesino by local artist Cesar Manrique: To me, he was clearly more successful at convincing the locals to paint their houses white, than at his sculptures
The drive took us through the Parque Natural de Los Volcanes and Timanfaya National Park: Albeit we missed the best parts of the area
These walled hollows in the volcanic soil provided to be good ways to grow grape vines on the island: The walls and hollows provide shelter and a way to collect and retain any moisture on this arid island
Our final stop was an Aloe Vera museum. To be honest, this felt more like the obligatory visit to a Turkish Carpet shop where the guide stops hoping you buy a carpet you don't need. I opted to have a walk along the road, rather than look around the small Aloe Vera exhibition and shop.
The highlight of my walk was this Cacti and Succulent garden by a large house
Finally, it was time to head back to the ship for a late lunch. As I was waiting for the coach to depart from the Aloe Vera museum, I saw two large Falcons circling over the nearby hill, but there wasn't time for a photo. This subspecies was formally split as Barbary Falcons, but it has now been relegated to a subspecies of Peregrine.
Our guide say that there had been more rainfall than normal on Lanzarote: Consequently, there were lots of plants appearing where it is normally barren, including this lovely display of purple flowers
We left at 17:00 as planned and there for time for ninety minutes or so of surveying from the top deck before it got dark. I managed to see a two single unidentified Dolphins in that time: one of which was probably an Atlantic Spotted Dolphin. It had been an enjoyable day and I spent a bit of time booking a hire car for our next destination of La Palma. I will cover the in the next Blog Post.
This was our first good sunset at sea
