Tenerife

Street decorations in Los Gigantes

Alistair and I had not planned to spend Christmas in Tenerife this year but one of my oldest friends lost her husband in October and was not looking forward to the first Christmas on her own so the three of us flew out to Tenerife on December 15th for a fortnight. Elvira's niece was to fly out later to join us for a week over Christmas.  We flew out before the bad weather but Claire had the misfortune to be flying out the day the snow closed Manchester airport.  She spent eight hours in the plane on the runway before a four hour flight. 

Here we have Elvira and I enjoying a sangria at Las Rosas with a view of Los Gigantes in the background.

Naturally Alistair was to found on the tennis court for a couple of hours every morning.  There was only one day he couldn't play because the court was too wet from an early morning downpour.  He played on Christmas day before we went out for lunch and on the day we left for the airport!  He brought out two raquets so Claire could play and here is a shot of the two of them.

 

 On the day of Christmas Eve Elvira and decided to go up in the hills to visit Tamaimo as in previous years we had seen en eye-catching display on a balcony there of the Three Kings and we had heard it had been much extended.  Well that was true but unfortunately the display was largely wrapped in polythene sheets.  The lady from the villa came out to talk to us but she had no English at all and our Spanish could only be described as less than basic.......from her gestures we gathered Tamaimo had had lots of rain this year.  To be honest we preferred the earlier simple display....now it is a combination of a rural life museum and Nativity surrounded and interwoven with fairy lights. 

In the second picture you can see the mist that descended every so often.  However just across the road was the town cemetery....it may not have been the most tactful place to take a newly bereaved person but it was interesting to see how they coped with burials on a volcanic island....... on shelves above ground....reserve a slot not a plot you could say......

The flowers were beautiful and colourful and the tablets very different from those found in Macclesfield cemetery.

Personally I think her children should have chosen photo of their mother at 28 (or even 38) rather than 78.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


A touching memorial to a beloved nanny with a little display of children's books.
 
 


We had planned to have lunch out and catch a local bus back to the coast at the end of the afternoon but the mist was pretty miserable so we arranged a taxi to take us down the sunshine back in Los Gigantes.