Lyn's Log, 15th November 2005
Tenerife, west coast
Los Christianos, Canary Is.
N28º03', W16º43'
3,656 miles.
After our mast was sorted it was sailing to Los Gigantes on the west side of Tenerife to meet our friends Linda and Norman Hart who were holidaying in Tenerife. The first day we only got to Los Cristianos an hour before dark and anchored in the bay, leaving first thing in the morning. We arrived at Los Gigantes around midday October 28th and found it not very comfortable, quite dilapidated and the power supply too feeble to keep our batteries charging – therefore no fridge. But we met up with Linda and Norman, and their friends Janet and Peter, in an apartment. Linda brought out our electric bilge pump we needed to comply with the new insurance regulations, and a few other goodies from England. We took Linda and Norman out along the foot of the very high cliffs of Los Gigantes and saw some dolphins, had lunch and then swam off the beach (see pic). It was great to meet up a few times and have lots to talk about. Andrew and I took a taxi to Masca village high in the mountains and walked down the ravine by the stream for three hours to its end at the foot of the Gigantes cliffs, where walkers are picked up by boat and returned to the marina. It felt like a mini holiday while in Los Gigantes, but after three days we left and made our way back to Los Cristianos. This time we went five miles out from the shore and found lots of pilot whales. They were a magnificent sight. and were very close to the yacht, lazily arching through the water’s surface and loudly blowing out their smelly breath!
Back at Los Cristianos we met up with David and Hazel of Ros Ailither, who we last saw in Cascais, and got lifted out on the hard for a several days. We have the boat out of the water to sort the rudder post and fit the new propeller we have been carrying around. I antifouled the bottom in just 2 hours, put the rubber fendering around the dinghy that we had bought in La Coruna, restuffed both the stern and rudder glands, and fitted the electric bilge pump in position.
The new sail was delivered by TNT to Santa Cruz who refused to accept it because we were not there, and then it was supposed to be redirected to the yard in Los Cristianos.
A package came to Los Cristianos. The delivery man had a wedge of papers in his hand and the top sheet had my name, boat name etc but underneath was a different name and boat, the name that was actually on the label stuck to the package. It was quite clearly not mine and I refused it. Every time I phoned TNT and gave them my tracking number they told me the correct name and confirmed Los Cristianos address, but also various things such as hadn’t I just received it, sorry it had been refused in Santa Cruz and sent back to England, it would be delivered tomorrow, it had just been released from customs, or it was still in England and hadn't arrived. We believed none of it. With a great deal of reluctance eventually I was told the address of the TNT depot in Tenerife and got them to give me their address. This was not easy to understand over the phone but nevertheless, we hired a car and drove to the town we believed it to be in. Here we asked ‘Tourist Information’ where this address was. No-one knew. Maybe just outside the town near the Civil Guardia barracks. Off we went again and found the barracks but still could not locate the address until I asked a policeman, who in turn asked someone else, and finally found the depot up a narrow alley. I produced my tracking number and was immediately shown our parcel lying on the floor still with the Santa Cruz address and no mention of Los Cristianos. It would be there to this day if we hadn't hunted it down. Then we found we had to pay two airport charges of around €50 and also the local VAT of 5% as the package had not been marked for ‘yacht in transit’, also around €50. So with about €30 worth of phone calls plus the hire car the sail had got quite a bit more expensive. TNT’s 5-day express delivery (costing £115) took just under 3 weeks and then only because we didn’t wait any longer for them to fail to deliver it.
The temperature here is around 29 during the day and 24 at night. Any exertion makes the sweat pour, but in the afternoon we can just walk out of the yard and into the sea for a swim and shower off under one of the showers dotted around the edge of the beach. We have hired a few DVD films to entertain us a few evenings and have fresh milk to make decent tea and coffee. While we had the hire car we decided to see more of the island: Mount Teide, the Orotova valley and Puerto de la Cruz. So life was not too bad! The landscape around Mount Teide where the road goes, makes one think of the moon – in fact some of Star Wars was filmed there. This time we were able to take the cable car to the top, walking around the rocky lava, looking over the top of the clouds and over another volcano crater. The air was a bit thin and at first we had to keep stopping breathless until we got acclimatised.