Gran Canaria - Spain

Las Palmas

Plaza de Santa Ana (Las Palmas) - Agaete (Gran Canaria)

I arrived in Las Palmas, the capital city of Gran Canarias and my last stop on this backpacking tour, after a 45 minute flight from Lanzarote. I was planning on staying about 4 days and ended up extending my stay to 12 days, having an awesome time and not wanting to leave. I went to Las Palmas to visit Manu, another lifelong friend from the German school in Medellin whom I’ve known since we were 4 years old and whom I had not seen in 12 years. The meeting at the airport was very emotional (we were both crying for a while) but it was very comforting to see that we haven’t changed a bit…Its as if time had stopped, we look exactly the same as we did 12 years ago....ji ji ji, or maybe it´s just us refusing to accept that time does pass. In any case, after the airport we went straight to “Las Canteras”, a very famous beach in Las Palmas and a very lively place too. We had a great lunch at a restaurant right on the beach. It was the perfect setting: great company, good food, nice weather, a beautiful view and wonderful music in the background. There were 2 older men sitting on a bench across from the restaurant who were playing a guitar and singing. They were actually signing a lot of old Cuban music I love: Mama yo quiero saber…de donde son los cantaaaaaanteeees…..seran de Santiago, seran de la Habana..la la la…..cuando sali de Cuba deje mi vida deje de mi amor…cuando sali de cuba la la la la la. In the afternoon we picked up Alica from school. Alicia is Manu’s 4 year old daughter. Alicia is beautiful, adorable and super kiut; and I also have to publicly say she is the best little girl I’ve met in my life. She behaves so good is unbelievable.

Las Canteras - With Manu and Felipe in Las Canteras

That night Manu had invited me to Chambao’s concert. Chambao is a Spanish group which plays what I call Flamenco-pop and who are very popular here. They are also known in Latin America and US (at a smaller scale) specially after the groups lead singer (Mari) sang a song with Ricky Martin for his Unplugged Album. The song is titled “Tu Recuedo”. The concert was given at the Plaza Santa Ana, located in the area of Vegueta which is where Las Palmas’ Old Town lies. On one side of the square you have the Cathedral and on the other side we had the stage for the concert. It was awesome. They played beautifully for 2 hours, they danced sevillanas/flamenco and they gave 100% to the public. (I have included a video from the concert at the bottom)

The touristic south of the island

On Saturday it was off to the southern part of the island: Playa de los Ingleses, Maspalomas and Mogan. This area of the island is 100% catered to tourists; most of them coming from Germany and England. The beaches are very nice and they are full of hotels, resorts and apartment buildings that are rented out to tourists. When you walk passed the restaurants all the signs are in German and everyone you overhear talking or placing an order is also talking in German. In there we went to a resort to have a session of Talasoerapia (Thalassotherapy). Imagine yourself in a jacuzzi the size of the swimming pool at the Fountainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach (just imagine a very big swimming pool that has no precise shape) filled with seawater; that is what Thalassotherapy is all about, letting your skin and pores benefit from the salt in the seawater. Afterwards we continued on our tour of the south of the island by visiting Maspalomas; another town filled with German and English tourists. A town that reminded me a lot about the Juno Beach/West Palm Beach area in Florida. We went there mainly to visit the dunes that are right next to the beach and which were pretty cool. Standing on top of one of the dunes and looking at the vast amount of dunes on the horizon you can to a certain extend imagine what it is like to be in the dessert. With the exception that in Maspalomas there was a cool and very nice breeze which I imagine you would not get in the dessert.

In Mogan

The Dunes of Maspalomas

On Sunday we made it a family day as Manu, Alicia, Felipe (Manu´s husband) and myself headed to the northern part of the island: Teror, San Mateo, Roque Nublo, and La Cumbre among other towns: a road trip that took most part of the day. I was surprised by 2 things: how big the island is and how geographically diverse it is. For some reason I thought Gran Canaria was smaller. I guess I grew up with the reference of San Andres island in Colombia, a rather small island I must add, in my head and therefore everytime I think of an island I think it is small. But it was not the case with Gran Canaria. We drove for many hours up and down the mountains (both Saturday and Sunday) and we still did not cover the entire island. On the other hand the island is very diverse, geographically speaking. On the southern part of the island for example the land is very dry, very arid and therefore everything has an orangy, brownish, sand color. Ey, you even have the look and the feel of the dessert with the dunes of Maspalomas. The mountains are just rocky and the only green you see is from the palm trees that are planted in a rocky/sandy soil to decorate the streets and sidewalks. The norhtern part is the oppossite. As you begin to drive north the mountains become greener, the vegetation becomes more dense (more trees appear as do flowers) and the temperature begins to drop as well. We drove all the way to "El Pico de las Nieves", the highest point in the island (1949m), visited the outdoor market in San Mateo, the Virgen del Pinto in the town of Teror (the patron of the Canary Islands), and had a delicious lunch with some typical Canarian food (papas arrugadas).

The South - The North

View of La Puntilla - In the town of Teror

During the remainder of the week I continued doing a lot of tourism with Manu like for example visiting "La Cueva Pintada", an archeological park located in the town of Galdar, the first capital of Gran Canaria. I was impressed by how well preserved they have the place and how organized they have the tour of the cave. The main attraction there is a cave built by the indians of the island which has its walls painted with the original artistic representations of these natives. Unfortunatley they do not allow you to take any pictures. In the mornings I would sometimes accompany Manu to drop off Alicia at school and then we would go have breakfast at the beach (Las Canteras). Some other days I stayed home sleeping and we would then meet for lunch and go to a mall or a nearby town in the afternoon. In one ocassion we even went to Yoga Class together and another time we went to a concert given by a group from Morocco. It was great to have the opportunity to spend this time with Manu reminiscing about the past, sharing our present, dreaming about the future and making plans to see each other again... in less than 12 years. It was also great being with Alicia. She is so loving and funny too. You know I love kids and I was missing so much being near one. At nights I would read a story to Alicia before going to bed (Surimus es una linda ratica gris que le gustan los quesos y los libros, Hoy la luna brilla y Surimus...etc etc. - Surimus is a beautiful gray mouse who likes cheese and books, Today the moon shines and Surimus etc etc-I learned it alsmo by heart as it was her favorite story and she would ask me to read it everynight) and in the mornings she would come into my room to wake me up with a glass of water for my thirst. I had so much fun with her!!! I had a hard time leaving and saying good by but I was once again very greateful to have had this chance after so many years of spending all these days with them. But just as the Nelly Furtado song goes "All good things come to an end" and so did my trip to Canaria...as will soon do my sabattical.

Alicia "adorada"

I´m writing this post from Alicante (in the southeast of Spain) where I am this weekend visiting a friend from the German school in Munich and where I´ll be only until tomorrow when I head back to Madrid to write the final chapter of this adventure.

Chambao Concert