Tenerife - were only 180 miles from Africa!

We hit land again today, and after six days everyone on board is bit giddy with excitement. So, you have to put up with/ or you get treated to a travelogue today, depending upon your point of view. Mike and I took our first formal excursion today and what a pleasant surprise. On previous trips we have detested the mad and messy gathering in the theater to trade your tour tickets for tour stickers, then lining up and following the activities staffer through the underbelly of the ship to make your way out on to the crowded dock and stuffed bus. Imagine how nice it was to show up 15 minutes prior to our tour departure time and find a very short line of five or six people and a small crowd sitting orderly around their tour numbers which were set up in various locations throughout the theater. All we could guess was that the orderly Germans and Americans had arrived early to organize as instructed, and after the designated times, the always late Brazilians, 70% of our group, would arrive late (like they do for dinner) and screw up our departure. We were half way correct. The people in the theater were largely American, German and Australian, but the Brazilians did not sign up for the shore excursions. Instead, they seem to have found their own way into town. One distraught man we saw after the ship left the harbor after our day in Tenerife was mourning the loss of his photos which he had accidentally left (along with the camera housing them) in a cab that he took to the car rental office. So, I guess the Brazilians are more independent in their travels and opt for advanced shore excursions rather than Shore Excursion 101- "plant your butt on bus and go where it takes you." Our bus was only a third full, so we had a nice, relaxed tour of the island.

Tenerife is the largest of the Canary Islands off the coast of Africa. While attacked and/or conquered by almost all of the big European nations, Spain was the winner. Now an independent territory of Spain with their own president, the islanders speak Spanish with a Castilian accent, which sounds as if they are lisping compared to the Spanish we learn in school. 80% of the economy in the Canary islands is based on tourism and the remainder is largely agricultural, so many of the population are multi-lingual making it easy to navigate with English/ Spanglish.

After our four hour tour of the island during which we saw the banana plantations (the largest crop), the extinct volcano marking the highest point in spain (12,000 feet), an ancient monastary now serving as a restaurant where we had coffee and pastry (just what we needed after 11 days on board!) and the waterfront. All in all, it is clean and safe and a nice vacation spot for the Europeans that flock here to beat the winter weather (the Northerners such as the Scandinavians) and the summer heat (the Spaniards and Italians). The climate is apparently great here year around, and if today is representative, I would agree. It was shirt sleeve comfortable today.

Most everything we saw is modern and clean. Apparently the Canarians (I did not invent that name, that is what they call themselves) have as much regard for their old buildings as we do. I visited an old church, but everything around it was modern. The aboriginal people here are notable for being blond and blue eyed, living in caves, having no written language and mummifying their dead. Sound like a cool group of people. I guess their homes didn't survive being conquered. They didn't survive it either.

I know we raved about dinners those first few days, but in order to spare you the whining we have been doing ever since, we have left out those days with horrible meals. Last night, as we dined alone with Roderick (the Brazilians didn't show until we were almost done so we had him to ourselves) we were greeted with something you don't often experience. As he handed us the menus he apologized and said that it was a bad day for eating. They were trying their hand at a Russian menu- a Russian hard boiled egg was the appetizer Roderick recommended. He advised skipping the Latvian soup, etc. Main courses such as chicken kiev (breaded then fired, two wonderful healthy ways to serve chicken combined! OMG) were the best of the lot. We ended up selecting the pasta marinera (Mike) and the grilled chicken breast (me) from the everyday menu. Roderick did offer to bring us cheese pizza from the kid's menu.

Entertainment has been pretty good, although tonight is the second night in which the big entertainment of the night is a movie. The first movie was described to be a Brazilian movie (in Portuguese) with English subtitles about some period in their history. In the beginning fifteen minutes it showed some queen in Spain marrying some king in some other country. Neither of them spoke Portuguese, so to help their primary audience, the subtitles from Spanish or whatever language it was in, translated the verbal dialog into poruguese. Apparently sometime into the movie when the queen and king were married and moved to Brazil they must have learned Portuguese and the subtiltes switched to English, but by then we were back in our room grumbling. Tonight's flick Tango, is supposed to have English subtitles. But, because they are only showing it once to both seatings it doesn't start until 10:30. Forget it. We had to get up at 7:00 am today for our shore trip, and again tomorrow to see Madeira, Portugal, so there is no way we are going to try and figure out subtitles tonight!

Love you all, Deanne