Travel Diary #4 – From Tenerife to La Gomera

 - 19 May 2019 - Travel diary

« Is this a boat that light over there? Wait but there are 2… and even 3… lannnnnnnd in sight ». If there is one thing that marked me during these 4 months in the sailing world, it’s the arrivals. When you just spent several days at sea, seeing the land truly becomes a magical moment!

I especially remember the first time we saw Tenerife. We had seen the first lights of the island during the night and I went to bed a little grudgingly, to be ready for the entrance in the marina. 

When I went out, four hours later, I discovered half asleep, the beautiful reliefs of the island ! It was my first arrival by the sea, the landscape was really beautiful and the sun was rising right behind us… How amazing ! 

I also really liked the post-arrival period. Because who says new island, says new marina, new neighbours, new view, new city, new culture, new language and of course new culinary specialties… After 3 days of cleaning and grocery shopping, we took back our bags, our tent and our thumb and we went to explore the island.

 

We were back to hitchhiking and we loved it : meet locals, question them to learn more about their island, listen to their advices, their anecdotes and simply share a moment, memories, laughs, smiles… and we loved that it gave us the opportunity to practice spanish.

The Island of Tenerife is really surprising. We discovered various landscapes : black sand beaches, jungles, endemic pine forests, banana fields, pricly pears, lunar desert areas in the national park of the el teide volcano (the highest summit of Spain rising at 3718 M)…

Before leaving, we also spent a day in La Gomera. A beautiful and unspoiled island in the west of Tenerife. We all agreed : it was way too short… But we still had time to fall in love with the place, its many mountainside villages, its narrow yawed roads, its terrasse cropsand and of course its culinary specialities : palm honey, gofio, sheep’s cheese…

On December 5th, we finally set sail to cross the Atlantic. We left around 14 pm with a funny feeling… the next time we will see the land will be in 3 weeks, on the other side of the ocean…

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