Canary Islands 1

After one day at sea after having left Cadiz we arrived in Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands.   The islands are part of Spain and are located off the west coast of Africa.

Santa Cruz is the co-capital of the Canary Islands and has a population of slightly less than a quarter million.  The Island have been formed by volcanic activity and the city is nestled between the sea and volcanic mountainsides. Tenerife, the island on which Santa Cruz is located appeared from the ocean floor 20–50 million years ago (give or take a few years).

Our first day in Santa Cruz, we explored the historic part of the city on foot.  You know how much we enjoy markets (and we hope you have no tired of market pictures!).  We thought you'd like these two.

    

The market in Santa Cruz is called the Market of Our Lady of Africa.  On Sundays, in addition to the indoor fruit, vegetable, meat, and fish markets, there is an outdoor flea mar  

We thought

The proximity to Africa was apparent at the flea market and that helped to generate anticipation of our arrival in Ghana in a few days. 

 

We had planned a quiet evening onboard ship Sunday evening, but late in the afternoon we got a call in our room from Shamim Sisson inviting us to dinner.  Shamim is a retired artist and administrator from the University of Virginia is the registrar for the voyage.  Her husband Jim Cooper is a retired Professor of Education from UVa.  They are good friend and colleagues of our friend Phil Gates in the Athletic Department at UVa and he has been telling us what great folks Shamim and Jim are so we were thrilled to get to spend some leisure time with them.

The four of us and a professor of communications, Terry Bangs (retired from the Air Force Academy) took taxis to a town on the mountain above Santa Cruz, San Cristobal de La Laguna.  It's historic district was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999 and many of the streets in that area have been closed to motor vehicles.

 We walked around that area for an hour and half and then enjoyed a delightful dinner in a little restaurant/bodega.  We appeared to be the only tourists there on a quiet Sunday evening, but the place was filled with locals.

We had a very traditional Canarian dinner.  We shared three appetizers: wrinkled potatoes, which are boiled in lots of salt and eaten with either a red or green mojo sauce, fried fresh cheese, and sliced morcilla with fries.  Morcilla is blood sausage and is a favorite in Argentina where Barry learned to appreciate it.  He had not had the opportunity to eat one in Spain so he was thrilled to see it on the menu.   It was listed as a "cold meat" and so we were expecting it cold and sliced like salami.  Well, it was slice, but nearly a half-inch thick and it had been heated.   Most surprising of all, it was very, very sweet.  Indeed, we almost wondered if we had ordered a dessert by mistake.  Barry thought it was quite good.

Here's a look at the potatoes and sauces.

 

Our appetizers had been so large that we split three entres among the five of us—grilled prawns and two servings of Iberian pork loins with fries again and a very salty side salad.  It was all delicious and we returned to the ship quite satisfied.