The Night of San Juan on Tenerife: 4 Fiestas & a Midnight Dip

We love the Noche de San Juan in Puerto de la Cruz; it is the place to bring in Midsummer’s Day on Tenerife, but we do it every year and subsequently don’t get to see first hand what’s happening elsewhere. Yesterday we decided to rectify that.

Detailed information about what’s happening in various places around Tenerife can be sketchy and a bit vague, so with no real timings except a knowledge that things tend to get going after dark, we headed west on a magical mystery tour of the night of San Juan.

First stop was La Caleta de Interian beyond Garachico, but to get there we had to drive through a pall of smoke around Icod de los Vinos as half the valley seemed to take the opportunity to barbeque their rubbish. As we drove past fires burning dangerously close to dry scrub land I realised why the Cabildo had announced last week instead of this how well they’d contained forest fires so far this year.

Lighting up the beach

Fiesta 1 -  La Caleta de Interian
La Caleta might seem a strange choice and Andy was dubious, but I’d chosen it because it actually did have a programme of timed events…sort of.
We parked up easily – it’s not a big place – and wandered down to the smart promenade where a couple of hundred residents and, bizarrely, a Chinese film crew were queuing up for sardines and papas arrugadas. The sun was setting fast and although it had been a cloudy day along the coast (typical San Juan weather) the sun had dipped below the cloud to cast a golden glow on the hills behind the town. As darkness fell, so did the temperature. As more people arrived at the seafront and a small parranda group tried to out-sing campers on the beach who were enjoying a mini rave, the beach was warmed up by a bit of Midsummer magic. Small torches placed right along the beach were lit as soon as darkness descended creating a fiery crescent. It was a wonderful little touch and a reminder to us that nothing can match seeing something first hand.

Warming up Garachico

Fiesta 2 – Garachico
Next stop was Garachico. A fire had been built on the cliffs beside the town’s small bay which was full of tents. It was much warmer in Garachico, especially as we had to walk within a few feet of the fire to get to the beach. This was something that was made a tad more exciting as a firework display beside the fire started just as we passed and glowing ash and sparks reined down on us. Not a lot was happening, but it had a seductively relaxed vibe.

The Wind Section

Fiesta 3 – San Juan de la Rambla
We’d read that fireballs were launched down the hill in San Juan de la Rambla, but by the time we arrived, everyone had converged on the picturesque plaza beside the church where a batucada group were giving it laldy, adding a bohemian beat to the town. Some people carried torches whilst others, with a touch that was pure Guanche, accompanied the drummers by blowing through conch shells.

The Main Event on the Night of San Juan

Fiesta 4 – The Big One; Puerto de la Cruz
As we drove back along the coast not long before midnight, a spectacular firework display lit up the Orotava Valley. Puerto’s party was in full swing. It was absolute chaos as we drove towards the beach with cars parked anywhere there was the slightest opening – crossings, pavements, anywhere. Cars were  streaming into town and groups of youngsters were still heading to the beach with carrier bags full of rum and coke. By a minor miracle we got lucky and found a space right near the beach. Compared to the smaller fiestas around Tenerife’s coast, Puerto’s party is in-yer-face larging it up. Tens of thousands of people packed the beach from Castillo San Felipe all the way to Punta Brava. As a band belted out 80s rock anthems we threw ourselves into the throng and headed to the sea for the obligatory Midsummer dip to the strains of  With or Without You and I Want to Break Free. The Noche de San Juan just wouldn’t be the same without some time at Playa Jardín.

If anyone out there wants to know what Midsummer’s Eve is like on Tenerife, there’s a very simple answer – it’s magical.

Just stick to what you do best.

"Are you 100% sure that's the famous Millenium Drago Tree?"

Ayuntamiento (council) websites on Tenerife can vary enormously in quality…those that actually exist that is.

One that I would have expected to be on the ball, especially in relation to content which would be of interest to visitors, is Arona’s; the municipality which is home to Playa de las Américas, Los Cristianos, Costa del Silencio and Las Galletas.

And sure enough they recently launched a new website aimed specifically at visitors. It’s bright and simple enough to navigate around.

However, I think they could have left out the ‘And Don’t Miss’ page of the Cultural section. When I think of ‘Must See’ locations on Tenerife, Masca, the rock pools of Garachico, the Casas de los Balcones in La Orotava, the Millenium Drago Tree in Icod, Mount Teide and the old town of La Laguna all spring to mind; the Almácigo de Arona – a nine metre mastic tree – doesn’t. And the picture of it didn’t convince me that this was a ‘must see’ that, until this point, I’d never heard about.

Then I noticed the entry titled ‘museums’ which intrigued me, because I couldn’t really think of any museums in Arona offhand. When I had a look through the list, I understood why; none of the museums included were actually located in Arona. They were all in either Santa Cruz, or the north of Tenerife.

These are just me being picky, Andy will eagerly confirm to anyone that’s willing to listen that it’s a bad habit I have, but what did really get me started on my moan about the website was the picture that went with the Corpus Christi entry in ‘Events to Remember’ under the ‘Get to know Arona!’ section. The text is about the flower carpets in Arona Casco and the picture is…from La Orotava.

Now the municipalty of Arona has many ingredients which make it a very attractive destination for holidaymakers, but depth of historic culture isn’t at the top of the list, that’s the north’s domain…stop trying to nick it!

Christmas on Tenerife – The Preparation

We’re not ones for roast dinners, partly because at our ages the price on the waistline is much too high, but mostly because the temperature here, whatever the time of year, isn’t one where you feel the need to stock up on body fat to get through long cold winters. So plates piled high with roasted meats, potatoes, gravy, Yorkshire puddings etc don’t really fit the bill…except at Christmas when we do have a full blown turkey dinner.

A foodie's treasure trove

The Al Campo hypermarket in La Orotava stocks up on turkeys from about a week before Christmas, so no problem with that, but buy it too early and you’ll have a seriously whiffy fridge by Christmas Day. However, although we normally buy our veg at Al Campo, it isn’t the greatest choice or quality. For that you have to go to one of the agricultural markets. This year for a change we decided to take a trip to the market at La Laguna to stock up on veg.

La Laguna, like La Orotava and Garachico, is one of those places on Tenerife which I never tire of visiting. There’s always something interesting to see and the marketplace is no exception.
It’s a bustling hall full of stalls piled high with tiny papa negras (potatoes), beets, courgettes, aubergines, kakis (persimmons), lemons, oranges, pineapples, melons, red and white sweet potatoes and bunches of lettuce and herbs. Then there are the salted fish stalls where great slabs of salted fish are lined up under huge bunches of dried red chillies, or the carnicería stalls where pigs’ heads look down accusingly from shiny butcher’s hooks (I tend not to spend too long looking at that one). My favourite stall is the spice and herb counter where rows of neat wicker bags are filled with mountains of sweet paprika, cumin, long sticks of cinnamon, curry and coriander.

Visiting these markets is more than a shopping experience it’s an assault on the senses. The prices are a bit higher than supermarkets, but it’s worth it for the choice available, the quality and not least, the experience.

The Things You See When You Don’t Have a Gun

In the last post I mentioned that the Anaga Mountains don’t receive as many visitors as they should, but that’s in relative terms. The more intrepid travellers make their way there as do some coach excursions, but the coaches are restricted to the wider roads which they can navigate, which means some of the most stunning spots are missed.

I’m not a fan of coach excursions; I hate the herd of animal aspect to them and the whistle-stop approach that many adopt. It’s like having a plate of garlic chicken placed under your nose and being told you can smell it, but you can’t actually eat it.

On Tripadvisor this week, someone was advising a first time visitor to the island of places where to go. It was good advice and included Masca, Garachico, Mount Teide and the Anagas, but there was one little comment that irked me. It was simply a reference to  Almaciga (a small coastal village) as “the most remote village on Tenerife”. Almaciga is a nice little village for sure, but the most remote on Tenerife – give me a break. It’s where many of the coaches that visit the Anagas stop for lunch; hardly remote. There are many far more remote places, but the coaches can’t get to them so they don’t exist. I’m sure the woman who was giving the advice gave it in good faith, but I’m equally sure that it was a piece of ‘misinformation’ fed to her by a tour guide and that’s another reason I’m not a fan of excursions.

Anyway, after our walk to Taganana we stopped at a little mirador (viewpoint) where there are wonderful views of both the east coast and the north. It’s an incredible spot; on one side of the road, the landscape is barren and dry; on the other it’s lush and velvety green. However, there was one view which was as unexpected as it was unwelcome. There was a minibus parked beside the mirador and outside it was a British woman in her early fifties with short blond hair and even shorter shorts. Whilst everyone else was enjoying the scenery, she was enjoying a cigarette. Nothing wrong with that, I can remember the need for a nicotine hit from the days when I used smoke, but when she turned her back to us she revealed that she was committing a crime against fashion and common decency that should have resulted in her being summarily executed on the spot. Her cut off shorts weren’t actually long enough to cover her buttocks. Daisy Duke she certainly wasn’t (dated cultural reference), but if that wasn’t bad enough, she was wearing a pair of big, black knickers which protruded a couple of inches below the hem of her shorts.
“OH MY GOD,” Andy gasped, absolutely horrified. “Doesn’t she have any friends?”

Clearly not, or they would never have let her leave her apartment. So here’s a tip, before you go out anywhere, always get someone to check how you look from the back; you just never know.

BUT…glug…I DON’T…glug…HAVE A…glug…GLASS!

Following the summer fete atmosphere of Corpus Christi, the Romería de San Isidro Labrador and Santa María de La Cabeza in La Orotava was a much more rumbustious affair. We’d been to the San Roque Romería in Garachico before, but this was a much bigger event. Up to 75 decorated carts pulled by lumbering huge beasts, rumbled and rolled through La Orotava’s quaint streets, followed by an assortment of gaily dressed men, women, lads, lasses and various donkeys, horses and other creatures.
The first surprise was seeing the fiesta queens leading the parade on the backs of a couple of camels (or were they dromedaries?). Where they looked elegant at the flower carpets a couple of days previously, here they looked decidedly edgy and smiling for the cameras came second to actually staying on their irritable carriages .
From 13:30 oxen drawn carts filled the streets. Children in traditional costumes leaned over their wooden sides handing out papas arrugadas (delicious salty potatoes), gofio cakes, eggs, almogrote sandwiches and, bizarrely, bags of popcorn. However, the real goodies were to be found at the back of each cart where the men folk turned savoury chistorria sausages, pork kebabs and slabs of meat on makeshift barbecues, filling the air with smoke which stung eyes and teased nostrils. Vino del País (potent country wine) was also being distributed from the backs of the carts; a fact which sort of explains why the longer the romería lasts, the livelier it becomes.

One of the things I love about the fiestas here is that they’re not exclusive. If you’re there, you’re part of it and nobody minds that you’re clicking away with a camera; quite the opposite in fact. Everybody wants their photo taken. I tried to focus on a ridiculously cute donkey and four girls jumped in front of the camera.
“Saca un foto, saca un foto,” they screamed.
Two lads in scarlet embroidered waistcoats, breeches and designer sunglasses didn’t want to be left out.
“AQUI, AQUI,” they shouted.
As Canarios danced and sang (I could be way off base here, but it sounded to me that there are only about three songs in the Tinerfeño repertoire) their way through the afternoon, the distribution of food and wine became more enthusiastic. At one point I thought I saw a man kissing a guinea pig. It turned out he was quaffing wine from a goatskin pouch. I have to admit to being disappointed, but I lined up the camera anyway. As I did, a hand grabbed my arm.
“Vino, vino?” A smiling young man held up a bottle of red wine.
“No, gracias,” I replied, but he wasn’t having any of it.
“Si,” he insisted, pushing the bottle my way.
“Pero, no tengo un vaso(but, I don’t have a glass).”

Apparently that wasn’t a problem. The bottle was at my lips before I knew it. By this point it would have been seriously rude to refuse, so I opened my mouth and swallowed for what I was worth, hoping that I wasn’t going to drown in his generosity.
“Bien,” he shouted after he’d poured about a quarter of the bottle down my throat. He laughed, patted my shoulder and moved on to bestow his gifts on some other unsuspecting soul.

It occurred to me that my British trait of thinking I was being polite by not accepting everything that was offered to me was way out of place here. In fact it’s rude not to accept the overwhelming amount of food and drink that comes your way, even if it means that by the end of the day you’ll be a fat, but happy drunk. Okay, I can sign up to that, but next time I’m bringing a glass.

Caught by the Fuzz

Had an interesting week, last week. Walking beside the volcanic stream which destroyed Garachico in 1706, trying not to squash the inhabitants of the Mariposario (butterfly) Gardens in Icod de los Vinos, photographing Pat Cash and Björn Borg at the Abama Hotel in Playa San Juan prior to the Tenerife Senior Cup tennis tournament, watching Man Utd make things difficult for themselves in the race for the premiership. It was a typical week here in that it was completely untypical. Mostly ups; however, there always has to be something which causes us grief.

This time it came courtesy of the Guardia Civil. Almost immediately after leaving the TF5 motorway (more of a dual carriageway) we were waved over by the boys in green at the San Pedro Mirador.

At first I thought they’d made a mistake and didn’t mean us as, for a couple of minutes, the officer didn’t even look in our direction. We were almost about to drive off, but then he sauntered over to the car and asked to see our papers.

I don’t know about you, but the very idea of being questioned by a policeman has me behaving as though I’m in Oceans 11/12/13… etc. Actually that’s rubbish; they’re all pretty cool in those movies, and I was being quite the opposite.

As he looked through our papers, of which I carry an encyclopaedic amount – just in case, he asked for a document which it hasn’t been necessary to possess for about three years.

“You don’t need to have that now,” Andy told him.
“Yes you do,” he replied.
“No you don’t,” Andy insisted. “Not since 2004, it’s European legislation.”

One of the problems that we sometimes encounter here is that European legislation is often ignored or, to be more accurate not known, even amongst those who really should be aware of changes in legislation. It can be hellishly frustrating and if you threaten, “Right that’s it, I’m taking you to Brussels, they think you’re offering a free holiday.”

The policeman didn’t reply to Andy this time, instead he continued to look at our paperwork.
“You’ve got a lot of papers here,” he’d clearly become bored with looking through them and handed them back.
“You were speeding,” he wrote something on a piece of paper and handed it to Andy. “It’s not significant, just sign this and pay the fine at the bank within a month.”
He hit us with an on-the-spot fine of €100 for doing 94kph when the speed limit was 80kph.

Andy didn’t think that she’d been driving that fast, so I asked the policeman if I could see the evidence.
“If you go to Santa Cruz, you can ask to see the photographs, but wait a few days first.”
Luckily my Spanish is still on a bit of a satellite delay, so by the time I’d translated what he said, thought of a reply, translated that into Spanish, my:
“Is that to give you time to Photoshop the picture,” was said to his retreating back.

We’re still contemplating going to Santa Cruz to see the evidence, especially as we had to pass the same way the following day and noticed that within a space of a few hundred yards the speed limit goes from 120kph to 90kph to 70kph and then back up to 80kph. It is pure loco, almost impossible to adhere to and potentially dangerous, but then this is Tenerife. Logic doesn’t always figure highly.

Force of Nature

The other day the phone rang, it was my 19 year old nephew, Liam. He was full of it.
“You’ll never guess what’s happened here, we’ve just had a massive earthquake. It was 5 point something on the Richter scale. My bed was shaking, posters were falling off my walls…it was massive.”
“Wow, that’s pretty freaky; were you scared?” I asked when I could get a word in edgeways.
“Only a bit,” he replied. “When I thought something might fall on my PS3.”
Glad to see he had his priorities right.

The irony is that Liam lives in Stockport, near Manchester. Hardly a place exposed to the extremes of Mother Nature. And he was the one who was most concerned when we announced we were moving to an island with a slumbering volcano.
I pointed out to him at the time that, if the island exploded it would up his coolness quota when he told people (i.e. tottie he fancied) that his aunt and uncle had been blasted into oblivion by a volcanic eruption. That seemed to ease his worries.

The reality is, as far as I know, nobody has been ‘Pompeii-ed’ by an eruption on Tenerife, despite one in 1706 which destroyed the wealthiest port on the island, Garachico.
However, I do feel closer to nature here than I ever did in the UK. Hurricane Delta a couple of years ago was a real eye opener. Watching trees bend double and branches fly through the air as though they were leaves left a lasting impression. Now I get a bit jittery if there’s a slight breeze. Similarly, seeing the night sky turned orange by the forest fires last year left me in no doubt as to who calls the shots here.

Earlier this week we explored the Valle de Santiago; a place that’s no stranger to the forces of nature. During the last eruption, lava flowed right to the doorsteps of two villages; their destruction avoided by the intervention of a couple of saints (so it’s believed locally). One of them, Valle de Arriba, rode its luck again last year when the fires encircled the village like an attacking army, but amazingly it escaped relatively unscathed.

Nature’s rampaging hand is evident all around the valley. Opposite old stone walls, which have been sucked into obsidian lava fields, are haunting forests of charred pines. It’s a schizophrenic area; part beautiful, part post apocalyptic desolation which brings home how insignificant we are. Despite our progress, nature could still swat us aside like an annoying insect whenever she sees fit.

This time it was Liam’s turn to experience the force of nature whilst our volcano continues to look over us benignly, until it decides it’s time to remind us who’s boss. Thank goodness it only seems to happen every hundred years or so; plenty of time before I need to start worrying.

Wait a minute; the last eruption was in 1909…Ooops.