Flowers in the rain!

Touchdown at Las Palmas airport and the passengers walk down the steps to the bus. The shock at the temperature is audible, and no-one is dressed for this! Cabo Verde wasn't paradise, but it was sunnier than this!

Greyrocks had booked a four night stay next to the city's main and glorious Las Canteras beach. An easy and cheap transfer by Global bus and city guagua took us to the hotel, where we saw on the reception desk several print-outs from the meteo website highlighted to show that the next two days (a weekend) had orange storm warnings:- wind, rain and rough sea conditions. The hotel room was comfortable and had fast internet (at last!). It had also been chosen for proximity to the promenade, a bath-tub, and a roof-top swimming pool area. Ruth tried the bath and discovered it was too soon in the recovery for her to sit down, and clearly sunbathing - let alone swimming - was out of the question; but at least our favourite restaurant was close by, so we ate there, paid too much for a bottle of wine from the local shop and had a quiet evening of TV!

Ready for Carnaval, or just our usual?

The owner of our hotel in CV lives in Las Palmas and told us that we would be catching the very beginning of the carnival. We set off on the Saturday morning to find out more and discovered that its main static location - Santa Catalina Park - was closed to buses, but that the theme was "Flower Power". That appealed to Greyrocks much more than our local upcoming one of "Science and Inventions"! We walked quite a way round the shopping area, made a purchase in the Lighting department of El Corte Ingles, and took the bus down to San Telmo (the other half of the city!). The sun came out and we enjoyed alcohol-free beers in the park, but it didn't last! By late afternoon it was grey and very cold. An attempt at a long walk down the prom was abandoned and we ate (pretty well) close to the hotel. As we did we saw that it was raining heavily, so it was dash back!

Sunday's weather was atrocious! From the windows of the high breakfast room the view of familiar landmarks was obscured and the sea looked treacherous. Our hotel has seen more glorious times and has a vast "Cafeteria" on the ground floor. After hours of lurking in our room we decided we would go there, but found it closed with only Scandies playing cards and a vending machine! So we girded loins and ran across the road to a humble bar. We were the only foreigners there, many of the rest being single older men tucking in to a very cheap "menu del dia". After one small beer we decided to join in, and declared this to be our Sunday dinner. (Hearty soup, paella  for one and ropa vieja for the other, coffee and and a glass of wine! Great value and shelter from the storm! Nothing more needed for the evening

Monday was somewhat better, so we took the No1 guagua again and wandered round Triana before coming back to Canteras for a tapas lunch beside the sea. "This is much more like it!".  We ate again at the favourite haunt, and flew home next day to hear tales of how Fuerte had suffered a storm over the weekend!

"No Stress" in Cabo Verde

That is the persistent cry from the numerous and ubiquitous vendors of craft and tourist tat on the streets of Santa Maria on the island of Sal in Cabo Verde. The town is the main holiday resort in the nation and is where Greyrocks spent two weeks this month. We didn't find it particularly free of stress, but the venture served its main purpose of sea and sand plus better sun than the Canaries can offer at the time of year! An additional bonus is that there are now flights twice a week from Gran Canaria, and they take only two hours! This is why we conducted the experiment, as we decided Goa would involve too long in flights with a recuperating knee or two! In that respect a real success as the journeys were ridiculously easy and stress-free!

Well, it isn't Goa! This article from The Mirror makes its case! This is still a developing country, but better than Goa in hygiene, electrical safety and manners on the road. Infrastructure, though, is not quite "there yet" and we had cuts in water supply on the majority of days . Internet speeds and availability were very erratic, many thoroughfares are not made-up and the one supermarket in town is small and under-stocked. With all of this, the wretched harassment in the streets and a dislike for the demeanour of most wrist-banded tourists we also decided that we would never be trying a Caribbean holiday, which we imagine would have many similarities! Tourists were mainly Dutch, French and British, with of course a fair number of Portuguese. Not many Germans -which is interesting, mercifully few Italians (they are all in Fuerteventura), and no Russians were heard!

"Call that a sunbed?"

"Maybe not today!"

Roll on faraway Goa in winter 2017-18, and save our neighbour CV for an occasional week! We would then choose accommodation with a pool. (There is some that is not All-Inclusive!) The reasons for this are the sea state in Jan/Feb, and the sunbed issue. There was glorious sun but a seriously strong wind. Fortunately this as a very warm wind, so sunbathing was fine if sheltered, and the sea was a good temperature but frightening rough, meaning that neither the one with vulnerable knees, nor the one with a fear of drowning felt up to real immersion. Furthermore it took us many days to find sunbeds with shade and wind-breaks that were available to the likes of us! (The 5-star Hotel Morabeza - with a very nice beach bar - offered mattresses and a prism headrest directly on the sand - getting down and up was an interesting experience for a rehabilitating geriatric, and the 5-star Odja d'Agua  rented out proper beds but in short supply and with little shade for most)

A genuinely stress-free place to hang out!

Finally we found what we were looking for at a bizarre - and seemingly older established - Funana Bar and Restaurant - which also had a "live" museum! It doubled a kite-surfing centre frequented by enthusiastic young Europeans from many nations! It is worth saying that water-sports - both serious and silly - are very big on the island; but otherwise there is not much to do or see beyond the glorious beaches! Greyrocks was not tempted by "tours", reported as "stretched", and feared more marketing opportunities!

And finally - the food bit! No surprise that everything bar fish has to be imported! The weirdest aspect of eating out for us was the pressure to eat early in the evening! It was amazingly chilly once the sun went down so tables indoors or in sheltered spots, or with patio heaters were like gold-dust, and most other punters were on the same mission. Maybe the fact that Europeans other than from UK, Ireland, Portugal and Canaries were in a time zone two hours behind home added to it! Anyway it meant seated by 6.30 pm or a long wait! Since no entertainment started till after 9pm we spent most evening with the BBC i-player!

Stewed buzio - yum!

Restaurants in Santa Maria cover about the same range as in the Canaries:- predominantly Italian in style  (if not ownership), smaller tapas places, grills doing imported meat, chicken and fish, a couple of French, one Mexican and serious fish and seafood specialists. Prices are higher however - even for the fish which can be seen be landed, traded and treated on the little jetty. Ruth liked the octopus and a stew of a local speciality: buzio, rather like thin squid when shelled, and in a rich stew.  Bob was persuaded to boneless fish on a couple of occasions and was reasonably happy! We found only decent wine - even the cheapest from a box, the local beer Strela is good and Ruth developed a taste for caipirinha  made with the cheap spirit grogue.
A bit of Portuguese oils the wheels, but service can be anything from jolly and brisk to casual and sloppy. An annoyance everywhere relates to the currency. The CVE (escudo) is "closed" and pegged to the Euro, with Euros being happily taken at parity, when the rate is about 1.11, so giving an immediate exchange profit, and change is often given escudos, compounding the gain. A bit of a taste left in the mouth!