Well today I went into full tourist mode with a day coach excursion all over the island. After a hazy early start, the first call was a camel park up in the sand dunes, this was where I discovered how wild and windy it can get over here, when the camel rose up bit by bit on 2 legs at a time, last nights beer nearly rose up as well.

Moving on, there was a stop at a Bodega to taste some wine, i was upset because there weren’t any pint glasses. Over here the vines are planted in little hollows in the ground, surrounded by small stone walls, protection from the strong winds.

The 3 course meal was pretty bog standard, a banana was one course but then it was on to Timanfaya, the fire park. This draws on the volcanic heat in the ground, first we helped ourselves to a handful of gravel from a shovel to feel the heat from it, then they chucked a bush into a small hole and it burst into flames and the party piece was the pouring of water into a small bore hole only to see it propelled up into the air as a hot geyser. I havent experienced such a hot violent eruption since my last strong curry.

I was also keen to see Jameos del Aqua, a centre built around a volcanic cave by Cesar Manrique, a celebrated local artist and sculptor. it was pretty damm impressive and the underground lagoon is home to the only Albino crabs in the world, they were very small but i treated them with respect, quite a few of my friends have complained about crabs after a holiday abroad.

All in all a good day and loads more info for my work. Now its off on the pop, i expect i will start at La Esquina and see where the wibbly wobbly road takes me. More soon