Tag Archives: Landscapes

Lanzarote Day 4 – Colora Tourer

Monday February 28 2022 – The day dawned with much more promising weather, although the yellow wind alert was still in force for the island (quite correctly – see later). So it was that after breakfast (including the usual very welcome couple of mugs of Earl Grey) we headed off to complete the major unticked tourist boxes for the south of the island – Caldera Colorada and the Timanfaya National Park bus tour (because you’re not allowed to walk in it).

The first part of the plan seemed to be going well when all of a sudden….

This was a temporary road block and we never quite worked out what was going on to cause it. After a few minutes the van backed away and we carried on on a completely clear road. Shortly afterwards, we parked near the Colorada crater and followed the path that led round it.

It’s quite near El Cuervo, which we walked into a couple of days ago, just a couple of kilometres as the raven* would fly if it weren’t for the bloody wind.

The bloody wind was practically non-stop gale force. While it never actually blew us over, there were times it seemed near to doing so. Because of the geology (you can see from the lumps above), the northerly gale meant you were either struggling into it, or being blown along from behind, depending on which side of the hill you were.

(Parenthetical note – it’s interesting to look at the Terrain View of the area in Google Maps. It gives a good insight into just how lumpy Lanzarote is. Colorada is marked top right and you can see Yaiza, where we’re staying, bottom left.)

As we started the loop round Colorada, we could see Cuervo in the distance.

As we walked along, the coloured part of the mountain, the south westerly slope, gradually came into view.

There were some people actually clambering up the side.

I’m not sure whether this is allowed, but there’s a sort of track leading up at an angle, so I suppose people do it regularly. We decided against it and carried on until the full glory of the coloured slope was revealed.

The lump in the foreground is a massive rock, called a “Volcanic Bomb”, which gives you an idea of how it got there – not something to be standing under as it came out of the sky. The red volcano’s colour is caused by a richness of iron oxide in the cinders that poured out during its eruption – among the last of the Timanfaya eruptions in the 1730s.

As you can infer from the terrain map above, the area has no shortage of substantial hills, each evidence of volcanic activity and each having a different colour cast.

The photo above is of Montaña Ortiz (so tiz). Almost unobserved in the foreground we spotted a pink geranium, just about holding its own against the wind.

One nearby volcano, Volcán de Las Nueces, provided a final striking image for the walk.

It’s a walk well worth doing; there are over a dozen information boards at strategic points around the volcano, giving insight into the geology at work and its effect on the landscape.

Our cobwebs having been thoroughly blown away, we set out to tick the other boxes – the Timanfaya Visitor Centre and the Timanfaya National Park itself. The former is quite large and has a lot of information for those who are interested in the specifics of vulcanology, but somehow didn’t grab our attention, so we didn’t stay long. Had there been a coffee bar, we might have taken a breather, but there isn’t one. There are toilets, though….

The day’s plan came severely unstuck some 4km down the road from the Visitor Centre, when it became apparent that the queue for the National Park was huge. Traffic was backed up in the opposite direction for several hundred yards, so we decided that no bus trip was worth that amount of aggravation. An early lunch seemed a good idea, and we had a recommendation of a specific restaurant – El Pescador in Playa Quemada. It turned out that getting there early (about half past midday) – without a booking – was a good idea as it soon got really quite busy. We had a good lunch with a mixed fish grill, and we’re happy to add our vote for the place.

Jane suggested that we should try to start exploring more northerly parts of the island, so we headed off in that general direction. As we were going along she suggested that we should stop at a feature called Las Grietas, a crack in the side of Montaña Blanca, just past the town of Tias. And so we did. From the outside, it doesn’t look much.

But climb in, and it’s pretty dramatic.

A person can just about squeeze through, and it’s a little tough to climb in the loose gravelly surface, but thoroughly worth it, even though you get shoes full of the little stones.

(That was just one shoe’s worth.)

As we headed back to the car, we noticed a couple of young people seemingly camped out beside it. When we got there, it turned out that they were a French couple who had no transport. They couldn’t call a taxi because there was no mobile signal and they asked us if we could give them a lift to the airport. They were lucky – Jane’s French is very good, courtesy of the time she spent living in Paris, and so it seemed reasonably safe to help them out – the airport was only a couple of miles away. So that was our Good Deed For The Day – they were very grateful. We never established exactly how they managed to get themselves to Las Grietas, but we were glad to help them, anyway.

We resumed our original plan, which had been to see some of the northerly bits, with the possibility of visiting The Other salt factory, Salinas De Los Cocoteros. En route, it became clear that we were heading into César Manrique country, as this installation on a roundabout showed.

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We were by then close to the César Manrique Foundation, set up to allow people to visit the house that was his home from 1968 – 88, and also the setting for a gallery of some of his art – and at the moment still home to a celebration of the centenary of his birth in 1919. As you might expect, it’s a striking place, with a cactus garden outside it

and another of his wind-driven mobile art works by the entrance.

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There are plenty of his artworks on display and the house itself is very unusual – Manrique exploited volcanic bubbles to create the lower floor

and the general atmosphere is very congenial.

Just by the house is a roundabout where Manrique was killed in a road accident in 1992. There are two more of his wind-driven mobile artworks by and on the roundabout to mark the scene.

Our next stop was a feature nearby called the Stratified City (known in Spanish as Antigua rofera de Teseguite), which is a large set of rocks which have been created over the course of thousands of years by wind, sun, and rain. It’s quite a sight.

It’s also quite a site for idiots leaping about and taking selfies, but that’s just my age showing again. I still don’t understand the thought process that says that a fabulously old geological feature can somehow be improved by having a gurning face in it. Anyway, we wandered off the main part and found a few quieter places for photos, and it’s quite an awesome place.

By this stage, the sun was nearly setting so we decided that Salinas De Los Cocoteros would have to wait for another day and we headed back to the hotel for a quiet evening. We still have many, many tourist boxes to tick in the north of the island, and it looks like the weather tomorrow will be as nice as today’s – and a lot less windy. So please check back in then and see how we got on, won’t you?

* El Cuervo is Spanish for raven…

Lanzarote, Day 1 – an early start

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Friday February 25 – And so the adventure begins – with an 0330 alarm for an 0430 taxi to Heathrow. We can tell when we’re on holiday – it’s pretty much the only time we have to get up early.

The UK is well on the way to unlocking as the pandemic recedes – restrictions no longer legally required but left to personal discretion. So we were not too worried about falling foul of paperwork as we left the UK, but still felt a little in the dark about what would await us as we arrived in Lanzarote. Jane had, as ever, done a masterful job of ensuring that we had completed all the things we thought we needed to do, but there was always a tiny lurking doubt in the corner of the mind that perhaps we might get an unwelcome surprise. So, clutching vaccination records and Spanish QR codes (backed up to Dropbox coz you never know), we stumbled out into the dark and into the taxi.

We actually arrived before the official start time for dropping off bags for our flight, but that didn’t seem to matter, and the bag drop and security parts of the process were swift and largely trouble-free, bar a poke at my laptop with an explosive detector swab. I didn’t see any instructions to wear a mask, but pretty much everybody was wearing one as they walked around. So we found ourselves a seat in what had by then become quite a busy terminal.

So busy, in fact that the queue for a coffee was sufficiently daunting that we didn’t bother.

The flight was uneventful and on time. Mask wearing was mandated whilst not eating or drinking, but since I had a rental car to drive at the far end I couldn’t join in with the chap sitting next to me as he waded into a couple of G&Ts. The main concession to Covid on arrival was that disembarking was done in sections. The first ten rows were called out through the front exit of the plane, then the last ten through the rear exit. Finally the middle rows were called and we shuffled off onto the mystery bus tour that ended at the terminal building.

UK passports are still accepted at the electronic gates and after the passport gates were some desks set up to review Covid paperwork. Courtesy of Jane’s efficiency we had the right QR codes on paper and were waved through immediately, so in practically no time at all we were in the baggage hall, doing the carousel stare thing. I took the time to pick up the keys to a rental car, the process for which took less time than the arrival of our cases. My bag took so long to come through that I was actually beginning to fear the worst, but it finally made its appearance and so we went out to meet the Castaways rep, Eva, who escorted us to our motor, a tiny Fiat Hybrid – brand new, just 18km on the clock. Tiny as it was, we could fit everything in and so we embarked on a tour of the car park trying to find the exit, which we managed on the second go round, with Jane getting reassurance from a nice chap that the exit was actually open.

I had brought a satnav with us which made the journey to our hotel, the Casona de Yaiza, pretty straightforward, and I discovered that I actually could still drive a car with a steering wheel on the wrong side and a manual gearbox, apparently without upsetting any of the other road users. I also discovered that I had got out of the habit of wearing a mask for short transactions indoors, and was politely reminded, when I refilled the car, that mask wearing indoors in Spain is still a legal requirement.

Because of our early start, our arrival at the hotel was quite early, too. The reception wasn’t quite ready for us, but after a couple of minutes a nice lady called Chus (short, I think, for Maria Jesus) checked us in and explained a few things about the island – good places to go, places where you’re not allowed to go, that kind of thing – by which time it was lunchtime, for which I was frankly quite ready, having had only a bowl of cereal and two large sandwiches by this point. So we went into the restaurant, which is quite charming

where we were served by a lass called Dominica, who was equally charming. The meal included a gazpacho based on papaya, which Jane pronounced to be delicious, and a fillet of a fish we eventually found out was called a pejerrey, a Peruvian Silverside (?) which was equally delicious.

Replete and tired, we had a short rest and then pottered round the hotel, which is as charming and quirky as the restaurant.

There are artistic touches all around, including some nice mosaic work

and plenty of succulents, some of them very substantial.

So this is to be our home for the next week as we discover the delights of Lanzarote – some walking, some driving, some appreciation of the art of César Manrique (who was to Lanzarote what Gaudi was to Barcelona) and some Nice Lunches beckon.

As the afternoon drew to a close, we thought we’d take a walk around, particularly taking up on a route mentioned in the book “Walking in Lanzarote”, one of the Sunflower books which we’ve valued so much over the years as a source of ideas for destinations and walks. So, off we strolled, past some amazing gardens.

One house had converted its garden into a vineyard.

Also, we passed some open spaces covered with just the black laval soil (more like fine gravel, really), in some cases with people working on them, although we couldn’t see any plants or other evidence to explain what they were trying to achieve.

Some of these expanses of black soil had circular enclosures in them. We can’t quite work out what’s going on, here – is it cultivation? Clearing for building?

The route description mentioned a flight of steps leading down to a roundabout which surrounded a Norfolk Pine. We found some steps

but they clearly weren’t the right ones. Heading back to the hotel, we eventually discovered what the route description had been talking about, but by that stage it was quite dark so a photo wasn’t possible. However, since this is close to the hotel, rest assured that I will eventually and photographically take the necessary steps.

That’s it for today. It’s been a long one and so rest and recovery is the order of the, well, night. Do check in again over the course of the next days to see how the week develops.

Day 12 – Yes, We Canyon!

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Saturday 10th July 2021. One loses track of time on an excursion such as ours. It was something of a jolt to realise that it was the weekend, at least for everyone else; we just carried on in our little dream world as we explored the southern region of Iceland before joining the “Golden Circle” route tomorrow. And, probably, hordes of bloody tourists. We’re now within range of day trips from Reykjavik, and it showed in the number of punters and the number of coaches at the various places we stopped for a gawp.

The first of these was yet another Interesting Church, this one on the site of a medieval convent at Kirkjubæjarklaustur, very near our hotel.

Like almost every Interesting Church we’ve come across, it was closed, and I have yet to hear a credible explanation of how come there are all these churches which seem almost universally to be unused on any kind of a regular basis. Is there a vicar or priest? Is that person a visiting official? Who pays for the upkeep? etc, etc. Anyway, it’s lovely to see such interesting church designs; and this one is not the last of this trip.

The next place we went to has to be one of the most arresting sights of our holiday in Iceland. It’s called Fjaðrárgljúfur and is billed as a canyon. As you approach it, you begin to get some idea of what awaits.

Then you look carefully and you can just make out a couple of sheep as the merest dots (just left of centre in this picture)

and then you climb to the observation platform and see this

This was the first Shot Of The Day. It is a truly awesome sight, without being completely overwhelming (like, say, the Grand Canyon is). A remarkable start to our day. You can walk down towards the other end, passing some sheep

(one was sleeping and we hope it didn’t really drop off) and have a look from there.

There’s a figure on the right bank as we look along it from here, and that gives some idea of scale.

We next got a chance to see a couple of uniquely Icelandic things. The first was a sheep rounding circle.

There are half a million sheep in Iceland – more than the number of resident people – and they are basically free to roam. This means that you can come across them almost anywhere, sometimes, alarmingly, in the middle of the road as you drive along. Somehow (by horse, dog, 4×4, anything that works), every September these wandering sheep are rounded up from wherever they’ve got to, a convulsive effort over around three days which is a massive part of Iceland’s culture and something that all farmers have to join in on. The sheep are herded into the central pen and then individual farmers pick out their sheep (they all have ear markings) and separate them into that farmer’s segment.

The second insight came as we got a chance to try to grasp the impact of an enormous event in Iceland’s – and indeed the world’s – history – the Laki Eruption of 1783-5. This was of staggering size and impact: an outpouring of an estimated 42 billion tons or 14 km3 (3.4 cu mi) of basalt lava and clouds of poisonous hydrofluoric acid and sulfur dioxide compounds that contaminated the soil, leading to the death of over 50% of Iceland’s livestock population, and the destruction of the vast majority of all crops. This led to a famine which then killed approximately 25% of the island’s human population. The lava flows also destroyed 20 villages. The eruption and its aftermath caused a drop in global temperatures, as 120 million tons of sulfur dioxide was spewed into the Northern Hemisphere. This caused crop failures in Europe and may have caused droughts in North Africa and India.

We stopped in the middle of the huge lava field resulting from this eruption. It’s difficult to convey the scale of it – kilometre after kilometre of moss-covered lava, because only moss – nothing else – will grow on lava, and this takes centuries to develop.

I created a Facebook 3D photo which might help to underline the scale of this.

Our next port of call was what Dagur called the “Yoda Cave” – actually used as the setting at the star of Star Wars – Rogue One, as the cave our heroine dashes into to escape from some band or other of marauding riffs.

It looks quite impressive from the inside as well.

This is in a part of Iceland that used to be an island, but the volcanic actions raised the land up around it.

This is close to a town called Vik, which has an Interesting Church, more for its location than its architecture.

In the distance to the left can be seen the “Three Trolls”, Reynisdrangar, rocky outcrops off the beach, Reynisfjara. You can get a closer view of them from Vik’s black sand beach.

We headed over towards them and I guess this was the first time we came across hordes of tourists – Reynisfjara is a popular spot and the car park was crowded. There are a couple of lava caves

one of which has basalt columns by it – popular for kids to climb on.

We carried on along the coast a short way, stopping at the clifftop at Dyrhólaey, which has a view over an impressive rock arch

as well as the surrounding countryside

it’s own troll

and – delightfully –

puffins! Dagur explained that these are often blown over from their usual colony to the east during August. The fact that some are here at this time of year, and that they appear to have burrows that they are using, implies that this is becoming an established puffin colony in its own right. I took loads of pics, obvs, and even nearly managed an in-focus one of a puffin flying off.

But the wind was gale force and so hanging about to try to get a better photo was not a comfortable option. We moved on.

The southern region is marked out, as I posted yesterday, by glaciers and the road to our next major stop offered a chance to get a nice picture of one of them – an offshoot of Vatnajökull, but I don’t know which one, I’m afraid.

The rest of the day was almost exclusively about waterfalls, which was a relief. It’s been ages since we saw a decent waterfall and I was beginning to get withdrawal symptoms. Our next stop, then, was at Skógafoss, but we were hungry so stopped for lunch at the hotel there before exploring the waterfall itself.

And it’s a splendid sight. The car park was crowded, as was the shoreline, with lots of people getting in each other’s way as everyone tried to get fucking selfies, which always enrages me. Mind you, I did manage to get something out of other people’s cavorting.

By aggressive use of sharp elbows, I got to the front where I had a few seconds to get a view of the falls unsullied by tourist vapidity. But actually, the second Shot Of The Day came about as a girl walked in even further through the spray towards the falls and gifted me with the perfect shot.

Before the next waterfall, we stopped briefly to view some turf houses in a place called Drangshlíð.

I found this post about them on the web, but it didn’t really leave me any the wiser.

A few kilometres along the road we stopped at Seljalandsfoss, which is another great sight.

It’s very popular, as it’s a waterfall you can actually walk behind

after having done which, you can walk along to another one, called Gljufrabui.

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And that was nearly it for the day’s interesting bits. We are staying the night in the Sel Guesthouse near Skalholt, and it is a charming place. Though the charm is somewhat rustic, it has WiFi and other mod cons, geothermal hot water in the bathroom, but no restaurant. So we made our way to the Farmhotel Efstidalur, which really is a working farm. From the cafe, you can see the cows

and upstairs in the restaurant you can eat them. We had a pulled beef salad which was absolutely delicious. Then we indulged ourselves with some of their home-made ice cream downstairs.

Thus ended our day. We will be Doing The Golden Circle tomorrow, with the major tourist sites and sights that this offers. It should be a good day, and it’s our last day on this tour, so let’s hope for a final Grand Day Out. Please check in tomorrow to see what actually happened, why don’t you?