Canary Islands

5/12/18 – 5/14/18

The first stop the cruise ship made was in the Canary Islands at the island and city of La Palma.

In La Palma we walked around the cobble stone streets.

We also stopped at a fort before sitting at an outside cafe for some wine and free WiFi. Yes – those are in fact black sand (obsidian) beaches behind us, since the Canary Islands are volcanic!

It was then back on the ship for dinner and a show and during the time the ship moved to the next island. The next morning we were at the island of Tenerife.

All of the Canary Islands were formed by volcanos and on Tenerife we learned all about volcanoes and how the islands were informed, prior to our lava tube excursion. We got educated about the types of lava flow and we saw the aftermath of Pahoehoe lava that is characterized by a ropy surface.

We were going to the Aa lava flow that formed tubes and went into a lava tube.

 The lava tube had a very rough ground that we walked over and was quite large in places.

The above image shows you the size of the lava tube – about 6 meters in diameter. And it turns out that the way lava tubes form, this tube is the smaller of another, larger lava tube that we were actually walking directly on top of, which was 30m in diameter. For those of you back in the states not using the metric system, that means it’s crazy huge! We weren’t able to walk in the much larger lava tube below us, but knowing that it was there and seeing the entrance to it gave us great respect for how radically volcanoes can impact and change the landscape.

Being in the lave tube was one of the coolest things that we have done on a cruise. If anyone has a chance to go into a lava tube in Hawaii or the Canary Islands we highly recommend it!

After the lava tubes we walked around the city of Santa Cruz and saw the Plaza de España. In the Plaza an Oreo festival was going on and people had remote control boats in the small lake.

The day after Tenerife we went to the Gran Canaria Island and the city of Las Palmas.

We had another excursion booked and did a nature walk. We went on the trail marked by the red dots.

After that we visited an old spa and then had lunch and wine in a nice town that was outside of the city.

The excursion brought us back to the pier at 2:34PM, despite having the ship’s all-aboard time of 2:30PM! Luckily, the ship waited for us as we booked the excursion through the ship, so they were given a heads up that our group was running behind. We were literally the last people on the boat, and they packed up the gangway right behind us as we walked on. We didn’t have a chance to check out the city of Las Palmas other than the bus ride through on the way to a from the excursion.

For anyone that has been to other volcanic islands like Hawaii (or that would like to visit them), the Canary Islands very much were similar in terms of the volcanic landscape and breathtaking views.

The Canary Islands are even home to a unique species of pine tree, the Canary Islands Pine, which is a fire-resistant tree!! It evolved to grow in the harsh, volcanic landscape, and evolved in a way such that the bark grows so densely packed that oxygen can’t get in between layers of bark. And without oxygen, fire doesn’t stand a chance; hence, they can actually withstand intense fires and heat, as seen from the charred image to the right.

Overall, the Canary Islands were a new stop for both of us, and one we very much enjoyed!