Tenerife, Canary islands

I love Tenerife (not the weather in March though😡 58° to 70° when we were there). It is the highest island of all those in the Atlantic and is the largest of the Canary islands.

This island has so many unique features that it's easy to see why some seven million tourists flock to this tiny island every year.

For example, while this tiny island of only 2000 square kilometers ( just over 700 square miles) and while it snows in the mountains, it is a major producer of tropical plants like bananas, avocado and citrus on the plains!

At the Alua hotel 

The place is absolutely pristine with narrow but scenic undulating roads, numerous beaches, (with both black and white sands) lots of shopping and  of course attractive hotels and apartments everywhere.

Another huge hotel

Most of the tourists come from Europe and we were told by our knowledgeable taxi driver Alexandro, that the Germans love Tenerife so much that they have their own enclave where ever the postman is German!😊

The original inhabitants were Berbers from the Sahara , but were subjected and exterminated by the Spanish after almost a century of resistance.

The area where the most bloody battle occured which caused the original population to surrender is the town known as Mensenay Meceyes which means "Kill some!"

We did a wonderful tour of the island in just one day.

When I say we, I mean my travel companions Sonja, Camille, Michelle and Kadi who joined us a day late.

Our first stop was at a national park called Icod de los Vinos where you find the oldest El Drago plant in the world. It's 800 years old and is a member of the onion plant! You calculate its age by the number of branches.

The 800 year old El Drago plant

 
This is near old Tenerife and a section where the very wealthy citizens once lived. Among that set were the ancestors of the south American liberator, Simon Bolivar. A bust of his is in the square.

Gara Chico island

This is the oldest monastery in the Canaries. 11 closeted nuns live here. There are no windows, no tv, no entertainment and they never go outside.

The oldest nun is 75 years and she hasn't been outside in 50 years😩!

 I have never been able to figure out religious zealots. Smh .

Cyclists love these undulating roads.

The waves in the old section get so large at times that sea water floods buildings across the road.

The most fascinating place I have ever visited is a remote village called Masca which is nestled in the Teno Mountains.

 The 20 km road to get there was only built in the 70's and that alone is a feat in itself. For it is narrow, hilly, winding and full of traffic as it is so scenic that people flock the area which has less than 300 permanent residents.

But despite the traffic and the hairpin curves, we never saw a vehicle with any dents.

Then it was on to Mt. Teide, their most famous volcano. ( Incidentally there are 303 active volcanos but only a handful are still active. Lao the island has small tremors almost every day. 

The last big earthquake was in the 80' but no one was killed.)

Mt. Teide

Mount Teide is the major volcano. It is over 12000 ft high, the highest point above sea level in the islands of the Atlantic and the highest volcano in the world, when measured from the ocean floor.

This is still an active volcano, having erupted last in 1909.

The volcano and it's environs are a national park of almost 50000 acres and was named a UNESCO heritage site and is the most visited natural wonder in Spain.

That's not fog but the clouds!

Section of old Tenerife 

In the Mt. Tiede national Park.

Time to prepare for our departure from Tenerife.

Our group at our first dinner on board 

Party time😊

This tenor closed out the night's entertainment.

We departed from the port of Tenerife at about 9pm.

More anon.

The holy Meteora

I can't wait for Google or AI to come up with a system where, when you see something magnificent, the lens of your eyes can become cameras and capture them. 

For there are things we sometimes see, that are too spectacular to be described in words.

We got examples of such today when we visited Meteora, an UNESCO heritage site, where you find the most amazing monasteries, just two and a half hours by road from Thessaloniki (that's where we are staying) .

To get there we traveled through lush farm country with vineyards all around, through  Tempe Valley and crossing the Pineios river.

The valley is  surrounded by the snow-capped 10,000ft  high Mt. Olympus (home of the gods) and to the south, Mt. Ossa. 

That route took us through a 6 km tunnel, the longest in the Balkans.

On this trip, I actually saw a real live shepherd surround by his sheep for the first time in my life😊.

Name of the Nunnery we visited.

Meteora means raising from the sky, as that's how the huge rocks with monasteries perched on top, appear from some angles.

It's from the 9th century during the Byzantine era, that priests from the Eastern Orthodox Church started to seek solitude there. As when Greece was occupied by the Turks, (Muslims) these christian monks retreated higher into the mountains. (To get closer to heaven too?) By the 13th century, they had built 24  monasteries in Meteora.

Only six of these are still operating today.

Unfortunately we are not allowed to take pics inside these monasteries but the view from outside is unbelievable.

James Bonds 'For Your Eyes Only,' was partially shot here.

We aren't allowed to take pics inside, but I got this one before being told.

We should have visited a monastery named Varlaam today, but the police redirected us as the Olympic Torch relay which started Tuesday in Olympia, was still in progress.

There are caves in some of the rocks and various rituals take place in some.

Snow capped Mt. Olympus 

Some adventurous people go great heights to take pics!