With my friend Pam over for a week, i’m in tourist mode, showing her the delights of the island. Saturday was a good day, an early start on the 343 Los Cristianos to Puerto de la Cruz bus, saw us at La Paz lookout point for a swift walk down to Plaza Reyes Catolicos for the free “Noddy” train to  Loro Parque, just before midday. I had doubted my decision to go to Loro Parque on a Saturday, and expected us to have to wait for at least a couple of packed trains to go before we could get on, but a train was parked up and waiting for extra passengers, no sign of the usual queue snaking around the plaza.

Arriving at Loro Parque, we got in quick, again no queues, a worrying measure of the current tourism slump. The park was, as always, fantastic, well organised, great fun and packed with shows and animals to see. At the entrance they were giving out leaflets for Siam Park and there were adverts in the Loro Parque guide, all saying “coming soon” . Before the Orca whale show, the giant screen showed an advert for Siam Park, and it flashed up the announcement “opening on September 16” that is the day after the official inauguration. There has been no confirmation of this date for letting the public in, but dare we hope ? It would be nice.

After a great few hours at the park, we got the bus across to Santa Cruz for the evenings CD Tenerife v Natic Tarragona football match, the start of the Segunda Division (one below Real Madrid, Barcelona etc)  league campaign. The crowd was a little bit dissapointing at 10,882, considering the red hot form of CDT in the pre season friendlies, but the atmosphere, fuelled by a few pre match beers, was electric.

The first half was pretty awful, with both sides struggling to put any good moves together, but Tenerife were fortunate to get a penalty just before the half time whistle. Diop fouled Sicilia in the box and Nino stepped up to open, hopefully, another high scoring season for him. Nastic soon dampened the enthusiasm with an equaliser after the restart, Moises heading the leveller.

Worse was to come after 72 minutes as Arpon made it 2-1 for the visitors, this was not going to plan at all. We needed a hero and after 74 minutes, local lad Angel was brought on, the game was slipping away when he made it 2-2 with a well taken charge on the Nastic goal with just 5 minutes play left. The volume was cranked up and Angel had the crowd in heaven 2 minutes later, heading a winner, cue wild singing and dancing on the terraces, the phrase “get out of jail” comes to mind.

All in all, a fine day, a jolly trip back down south on the Armada Sur coach, and a few more beers, rounded off a perfect day, maybe this will be our season.

CD Tenerife were back on the island this weekend for 2 friendlies, and they were very impressive in winning both. Friday evening down at the Las Americas stadium they beat CD Marino, from 2 divisions below CDT, 2-0. Born again forward Cristo scored his second pre season goal and eye catching new boy Alfaro added the other. A decent workout, with the usual mass substitutions late on and a crowd of 800 or 1,200, depending on which paper you believe.

Sunday was expected to be the much sterner test,for the Teide Trophy, against Primera side Athletico Bilbao at La Orotava, they had won all their friendlies to date, including victories over Millwall and Charlton on a short English tour. The Armada Sur had a coach up, but with the extra distance, we powered past our usual TF1 motorway beer stop at the Oasis and broke the journey at a petrol station, with bar, near Los Rodeos, the north airport. I often wonder why they built an airport there, it always seems to suffer from very low cloud which nearly envelops the airport, and it’s chilly, many of us were questioning the wisdom of wearing shorts.

After a few beers at a bar just down from the ground we paid out 15 euros (ouch) and went in. I went to a pre season game there last year, and it was immediately obvious that this was virtually a full house with fans taking every lofty vantage point and a large section of Bilbao fans. The Sur and the other main noisy peñas (fan clubs) took the far corner and started the usual songs and chants as we anticipated a tough match.

Tenerife came out like a steam train and were all over Bilbao, after 10 minutes an Alfaro corner found Nino, and the little striker did what he does best, popped it in the goal. CDT faded a bit as the first half went on and Bilboa tied the score with a Munoz goal. The second half saw Tenerife really take control, Kome floated the ball in from the left and Oscar Perez (pic) charged in to make it 2-1. Could it get any better? yep, Kome was again involved, shooting at goal and when it rebounded to Nino, he was lethal to make it 3-1.

Despite the local Guardia Civil standing down in front of us and trying to stare us out all game, the final whistle was the call for everyone to pile on to the pitch. The Teide Trophy was presented to Cristo Marrero, it looked like a large under arm deodorant, not sure what happened to the large flat landscape of Mount Teide that is normally presented. The players all mingled with fans on the pitch and posed for photos, before we all piled on the coach for the long trip back down south.

It seems like forever since my last fix of live football, well mid June to be precise, thankfully the wait is over and CD Tenerife have started on their pre season friendlies. This is a great time of year, all things are possible and all teams are equal, surely this will be our season for promotion and a good cup run.

Tenerife always have to wheel and deal carefully in the transfer market, no big money signings for us, the club are chipping away at their debt, it stood at 44.9 million euros in December 2005 and is expected to drop below 30 million by the end of this year. Some new faces have been brought in, 2 new goalies and some new forwards to help our free scoring hero, Nino (pic) as he hopefully continues to bang in the goals.

In keeping with tradition, Tenerife have started with a training camp and some light friendlies over on La Palma, their first competitive game was a 0-0 draw on Sunday against Tijarafe. This weekend sees a flurry of activity, with a Friday evening game, kick off 8.30pm, at CD Marino, the Las Americas ground that many visitors think is our home. This will be a chance to try all the squad out, everyone will get a run out, even Gladys the tea lady will probably get on for the last 5 minutes.

Sunday will be a much sterner test, Athletico Bilbao from the Primera, are the visitors for an 8.30pm game at La Orotava, the pre season games tend to be spread around, a good chance for the smaller teams to get a much needed boost in gate money, and as the home pitch at the Santa Cruz Heliodoro has just been re-laid, it will give it time to settle. For the first time I can remember, the Armada Sur will be running a coach to a pre season game, our Canarian friends from the Frente Blanquiazul also have a coach up, so we will be meeting up for a pre match aperitif or 2.

Next Thursday CDT fly to the mainland to play Real Valladolid and back in time for a Sunday game against Universidad Las Palmas at La Laguna. At last on Saturday August 23, we get a chance to pile back into our home stadium with the visit of Dutch Premier team Roda J C , that should be a real treat and a good test before the Segunda Division league programme kicks off on Sunday August 31at home to Nastic.

I’m all ready, my season ticket is on order and i have even washed my scarf. No doubt it will be another roller coaster season with the 2 derby games against the Pios of Las Palmas, engraved on our hearts for November 23 away and April 26 at home. Vamos Tenerife !

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It must be a good sign that big companies are ready and willing to plough large sums of money into Tenerife developments, I wonder if they allow a few extra months as standard for delays here, or do they have supreme faith, only to end up pulling their hair out with the rest of us.

Yesterday I went to see the new Tenerife Top Training sports centre just above La Caleta, according to the website, open in June. I trekked up the hill at the side of Golf Costa Adeje, into a heartland of building sites for various projects. Director Carlos Paulsen gave me a thorough guided tour of the site, with our hard hats on, and although the main parts are finished, there is still a lot of work to do before the late August opening of the doors to the public.

The 2 outdoor pools and surrounding area are not only finished but have the lane dividers and blocks in place. The main pool is the Olympic size 50 metres, and the other is half that size, down below, indoors is a therapy and training pool where cameras film swimmers going against a water flow, treadmill style, to be analysed for state of the art bio mechanics.

The football pitches are floodlit, one is grass and the other artificial, they look about ready, but the walkways down to them are a bit of an assault course at the moment, until all the cement work is done. Inside the main building, there are various gyms, changing rooms and physio facilities. It looks good, i just hope they can complete it pretty quick, we don’t need another Siam Park type delay. For a more detailed report, see www.discovercostaadeje.com another of the Sorted Sites commercial websites I copy write for.

As I was in the area, I decided it was time for another visit to the fishing village of La Caleta. It’s a very lovely place where a range of tasty fish reataurants hug the coastline, and large slabs of eroded rock form great surfaces for sun bathing, and launch points into the sea, if you choose not to use the metal ladders provided.

To the west a prominent point has a very enticing pathway leading over to the next bay, I will try that one some time. I have been just off shore there on a boat trip and it looked pretty deserted, but i’m told it is a haven for hippies and nudists, or even nude hippies. La Caleta seemed very quiet, it was 1pm by now but hardly any of the little bars and restaurants had customers, seems a shame seeing the huge 4 and 5 star hotels further to the east, are usually bulging, but I suppose they are all inclusive and seldom venture out of the gardens. It must be particularly cruel if these small family business’s are struggling to survive with all the wealth and oppulence swilling about a short hop away.

The worst sight of my trip was the state of the Playa de la Enramada, former home to the Chirinquito beach bar and chill out area. I knew they were demolishing the bar and “improving” the stretch of beach, but it looks like a war zone at the moment with huge hills of sand and JCB’s ploughing up and down. We can only hope that the finished product isn’t a complete mess.

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Although I love sport, athletics doesn’t normally excite me, but I will be popping along to the Spanish Athletics Championships in Tincer, Santa Cruz this weekend. It’s just too good an opportunity to miss, a major national event so close to the Olympics and a chance to see a few medal hopefuls, Mario Pestano (pic), the discus thrower is a good bet for Tenerife glory. It’s also a chance to look inside this amazing modern stadium, the Centro Insular de Atletismo de Tenerife (CIAT) to give it its full name, is sunk into the ground with just a low stone wall and the floodlights protruding, so it resembles a volcanic crater. The stadium has won several design awards an was included in an exhibition at the M.O.M.A (museum of modern art) in New York.

But getting back on track, and field, the championships take place on Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 July from 10 am until 9.30 pm with a break from 12.30 to 3.30. There will be 700 competitors taking part in 42 tests, including heats and finals, split evenly between men and women. You would expect such a big event to be pretty expensive but full price adult tickets are just 6 euros each day, or 10 euros for both days, and can be bought at the stadium on the days, but not between noon and 4 pm.

There is a glossy colour leaflet available in some information and cultural centres, certainly in Los Cristianos, which details all the events and times, or you can check out the website www.tenerifeatletismo.es . As for getting there, take the Puerto de la Cruz and El Campo turn off from the TF1 before Santa Cruz, opposite the Fred Olsen building, and head for the floodlights. The publicity says car parking at the stadium, although this will be by far the biggest event held there so far. I will be catching the 110 or 111 Titsa bus up into Santa Cruz and changing to a 232 at the bus station, it should drop me pretty well outside, I hope.

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They like to make us suffer, but thanks to a strong first half display, CD Tenerife beat Nastic 2-1 at home to make sure they can’t be relegated from the Segunda division. A few months ago, the talk was of promotion but 9 games without a win saw Tenerife slip worryingly near to the trap door, such are the ups and downs of being a football fan.

Coach Oltra made a few changes bringing local boys, Hector and Rosquette back into the squad, with Hector starting in defence. Just 5 minutes into the game, and from a Longas corner a Nino shot squirmed under the goalie and Culebras got a foot to it to push it in for a goal. The home lead didn’t last long and a defensive slip after 10 minutes let Calle in to level the scores. Tenerife played some good football and created plenty of chances, Oscar Perez and Longas both went close. The one player that has been outstanding all season is forward Nino, and when a Hector cros came to him just out side the goal area, he brought it down well and lashed it into the Nastic goal for his 18th of the season.

 The second half was pretty awful as Tenerife sat back and let Nastic take control of the game. Jandro forced a great save from Navas in the home goal and Sanchez hit the post as Tenerife rode their luck. Somehow Tenerife manged to keep the visitors at bay and there was a huge sense of relief at the final whistle with Tenerife finally safe from the dreaded drop.

 It was a low key (6,900 crowd) end to a home season that after the early promise faded away and left us fearing the worst. At least now the chaps from the Armada Sur going to the final game at Malaga next week, can relax and enjoy their beer. Our despair has been all the worse for seeing Las Palmas rise up the table into the top 6, if only we had won away to the Pios, but they added on extra time until they got their equaliser. In the meantime, planning is already underway for next season, and I can reveal that the first big signing is a Brit. Peter (see pic) is a lively front man, always on the sniff, and he is always willing to work his way down the white lines. There is just a small transfer fee involved, payable to the Central London magistrates court.

If I close my eyes, I can still see Hot Gossip dancing to Supernature by Cerone, not a confession, just tenous link number 457, to get me onto the subject of nature’s bounty here in Tenerife. Today I popped over to the lovely fishing village of Las Galletas, and after frightening the fish I went to see the opening of the 3 day Plant and Flower Fair.

This annual show takes place in Las Ramblas (straight on past the beach) and features stalls of local flora as well as honey, mojo sauces, cactus etc. It’s well worth a look, even if you are not tempted to buy, during the weeekend, 10am until about 8pm, there will be various music and dance offerings on the stage, and the judging of a local photo competition.

Whizzing back to Los Cristianos, I caught the opening of the evenings Wine Fair, just before the dock area. All the exhibitors were bodegas (vineyards) from Tenerife, only 5 are listed in the official programme but I counted 8 stalls. Despite the arid soil, Tenerife has a history of producing some fine wines, Guimar, La Orotava and Abona, were among the areas showing off their produce. I was of course hoping to do some sampling, and had specifically taken along my pint glass, but they weren’t making free with the vino. I believe the idea later, was to buy a ticket for a nominal fee, to sample wines, and then that price would be knocked off any purchase. By the way, the young lady in the photo isn’t miserable, she’s just popping one off – a cork that is. If you are into your wine, many of the islands bodegas do tours, followed by sampling, just check your local tourist information or cultural centre.

Well, as this seems to be turning into a weekends “What’s On” I might as well cover a couple of other things. On Sunday, there is a big cycle ride starting from Guia de Isora at 9 am and ending back there at about 1.30 pm, after going through Chio, Tamimo, Santiago del Teide, Arquayo (high point 1,250 m) , Tejina, Armeñime, Alcala, and Playa San Juan, that’s a total of 71 kms. It’s organised by the Chineje Cycle Club, click on the name for more details.

And Sunday is a sad and worrying day for me, the last home game of CD Tenerife’s football season. With promotion chasing Malaga away in next weeks finale, we still need a point to make sure we can’t get relegated, so there will be plenty of singing juice imbibed before the 5pm kick off. Vamos Tenerife.

Well I returned to Tenerife the way I flew in, via Manchester, and I must say I was impressed with the city. It must be around 15 years since I last went there to watch Manchester Storm play ice hockey at the MEN arena. A lot of money and effort has been put into the city and it shows, from Salford Keys (pic) to the city centre with its own millenium wheel. The big Premier Inn building had Peregrine Falcons nesting high up, and a camera trained on the nest showed pics on a large city centre screen – with not a word from Bill Oddie.

One warning though if you are flying out of Manchester Terminal One, it’s under redevelopment and has little in the way of services. My flight was midnight, and the few shops after check in, were closed, as well as the American muffin cafe, and worst of all NO BAR, that’s unheard of, even Camberwick Green airport would have a bar. It was bad for familes with children, and passengers for a Malaga flight had suffered a 3 hour delay. Of course the large duty free shop was open and you are channeled through it on the way to the boarding gates.

My flight was with Futura Airways, who have the less then reassuring shortened title of FU Airways. Once on board it was ok, although the stewardess’s wear black leather gloves as part of their uniform, maybe they make specialist movies as a sideline. Anyway, back in Tenerife at 4am on Saturday morning, and a taxi soon had me home, at 21 euros thats pretty reasonable.

Now it’s catch up time, this looks like a busy month, Aguaviva has started some of its events as it builds up to the big music concerts. I’ve only scratched the surface of the papers and news sites from the last few days, but already there is a lot to look forward to and the small matter of the last 2 games for CD Tenerife. They drew 2-2 at Celta Vigo on Saturday, that’s 9 games without a win, and still a point needed to make sure they can’t be relegated. I’m raring to go, come on June, lets be having you.

Only a few days ago I was talking to a few other local writers, and of course we had a good old moan about the downside of living in Tenerife. One of our common frustrations was the lack of advance publicity for events in Tenerife, and when the government, council or private promoters do swing belatedly into action, it usually involves a press release a few days before the event. This is as useful as a chocolate fireguard to the Brits, as one paper comes out weekly and the others fortnightly. Anyway since that meeting, I have already come across several more examples of ” hark, hark, whisper, who cares, if we don’t tell a soul, there’ll be more empty chairs”.

Today, Saturday, the Canarian rugby champions, Nandu of Tenerife, are playing a friendly at the Adeje stadium against Trafford M.V from Manchester at 4pm. I’m sure a few rugby loving Brits would have fancied that, but I only found out this morning from a poster just put up in a shopping centre.

And the next. A couple of days ago, I discovered there is a Tapas promotion in Granadilla de Abona from May 15 to June 15, with many bars and restaurants offering tapas for 2 euros or less. This covers popular places like El Medano, and Los Abrigos but when I was in Granadilla town tourist office barely 2 weeks ago, there was no mention of it, I eventually saw a leaflet in a Arona tourist office yesterday. There is a competition on the leaflet as well, get 20 of the participating outlets to stamp your leaflet and you can win a meal for 2. I comb through all the Canarian papers every day and haven’t seen this promotion mentioned, maybe you have to go to the council website and search it out, but you would need to know it was there to look in the first place?

Well, here’s one FREE event that I saw a poster for today, a whole week in advance. It’s the Canarian Roller Figure Skating Championships in Las Galletas, next Saturday May 24 at the sports hall in Avenida del Principe Felipe, that’s the 2nd stop in on the bus. It takes place from 9am until 2pm and 4pm until 9pm and as well as the competition, features displays from a former Italian champion, Simone Fraietta and 3 times World Champion, Luca D’Alisera (in pic).

The poster was in Los Cristianos on the same shop that advertised a FREE christmas roller skating gala, so it’s probably someone who is heavily involved in the sport. The sports hall, how many know that is there, took 5 years to build and is pretty basic but most things they stage there are free. I have been a couple of times to see the in line hockey team (it’s the nearest I will get here to my ice hockey fix) the Tenerife Guanches, it’s out of season at the moment but I will do a piece when they start up again.

Anyway, all those frustrations aside, it’s been another glorious day here, and life is good. There is a big summer of events ahead, so let’s hope that they are all a big success and well attended, I will try to do my little bit to publicise those I can find out about.

I hope the passengers on the Independence Of The Seas cruise liner enjoyed their day in Santa Cruz, I certainly did. I arrived early afternoon, armed with my camera, and made for the docks to see the monster new ship that had arrived from Southampton on it’s maiden voyage. The port authority had taken a full page colour spread on the back of all the local Canarian papers to welcome the liner, and with a month of celebrations going on in the capital, the bunting and flags were out.

The roof of the Fred Olsen ferry terminal was the best vantage point, so I joined the rather small crowd to snap a few shots, at this point I suppose I better drop in some stats about the ship. Built in Finland, the Independence Of The Seas is the biggest european docked cruise ship at 339 metres long and 56 metres wide, it weighs 158,000 tons, has 18 storeys, 1,815 cabins – 844 of them with a balcony and 120 suites. The facillities are amazing, an ice rink, theatre, casino, an on deck surfing area and masses of shops, restaurants and bars. The 11 night cruise it is on now had already called at Funchal and was going on to Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, Lisbon, Vigo and back to Southampton. It was a little disconcerting to see someone welding low down on the bow of the ship, just below the cabin portholes, worrying if you have paid anything from 933 euros.

On to the football and hopes were not high with Sporting Gijon the visitors, needing points to help their promotion push, both Tenerife and Gijon had missed out to Madrid the day before in the contest to host the Davis Cup tennis in September, so at least they had something in common. The game was frustrating, Tenerife had loads of chances in the first half but couldnt score and Sporting took their only 2 chances well with 2 cracking strikes into the top of the Tenerife net after 27 and 40 minutes. There was no way back and the few hundred Sporting fans celebrated their move into second spot.

As the Armada Sur coach drove off I stayed on and met up with a mate of the General’s, Tony, and we took the short walk to the Palicio Municipal de los Deportes to see a tribute show to Pink Floyd’s The Wall. The sports hall is tucked just behind the football stadium, this was my first visit, and I was impressed, bright and modern with raised seating on 2 sides and more seats put out down at floor level in the centre. The Wall is a pretty ambitious work to tackle, Pink Floyd only performed it a few times on stage, Gonzalo Valdivia and his 6 musicians did a great job of it though. When they came out, there was a small wall built at the front of the stage, which they duly kicked down, there was a big screen behind the band and one in front at each side that showed a mix of clips from the film version of The Wall, new images and the lyrics in Spanish, they sung in English.

It’s a shame the hall was barely half full, most were pushing middle aged, aren’t we all, and there was a nice mix of Spanish, Brits and some Germans. Beer was widely available, and due to a miss calculation over bus times , we had realised we would either have to leave before the end or kill time in Santa Cruz until the 2.30am bus to the south, so we started as we meant to go on with the beer.

For those who don’t know The Wall, it’s a dark epic about a rock star descending into madness, with themes of islolation and a bullying state. The bands excellent playing and singing skills managed to capture that, with Comfortably Numb and Run Like Hell the highlights for me. As the story reached the climax, the band took a breather for The Trial, leaving the film clips running with the superb animation of Gerald Scarfe. They returned to  raptourous applause and launched into other Pink Floyd classics like Wish You Were Here, Time, Money and a soaring version of Shine On You Crazy Diamonds. After Echo and the Bunnymen 2 weeks ago, this underlined the great musical delights that the north of the island has to offer.

A slow crawl around Santa Cruz brought us to the vibrant bar area just by the Plaza de la Iglesia, it was packed with no sign of slowing down even at 2am, and several Sporting Gijon fans were still toasting their teams success. The bus ride to the south slipped by in a snooze and I headed home with Pink Floyd tracks replaying in my little happy brain. Just a small footnote, I checked my emails this morning and found I had won a ticket to the concert from La Gaceta de Canarias, the mail arrived just after I had set off yesterday – never mind, it was 12 euros well spent.