The weathers been a bit hit and miss this last week, but we’ve made the most of it. Swimming at our sheltered spot in Costa Teguise. Walking the interesting Famara beach, with its dark mountain backdrop. Continuing on the Manrique theme, we took a trip to see his final (he died in 1992) project; “El Jardin de Cactus” it has 1000+ cacti with over 450 different species. The garden itself was created inside an abandoned landfill and thoughtfully created to add a tourist attraction to an otherwise failing agricultural area. It’s a peculiar place, set against the backdrop of black volcanic stone, with sculptures and water features, which only aids to accentuate these interesting plants. Although none of them seem to be native, many of them are now thriving freely across the island. The cacti are woven around the inside of the bowl on ascending levels, with the whole project blending seamlessly and worth a look. We headed up to Haría, which sits at the most northern tip of the island and is a charming little village nestled in the valley of 1000 palms. On the way back we made our way to “Valle de La Geria” the now highly acclaimed wine region. A dark volcanic area that sits in the valley between the mountains and volcanoes. Again incredibly this baron looking area is dedicated solely to wine growers, who use a growing technique where they create individual funnels (a geria) dug 2 to 3 meters below the volcanic ash, allowing the plant to reach the fertile soil and retain the moisture and dew, capped off by building dry stone walls around them as protection from the constant trade winds….very resourceful indeed! We discovered a wonderful restaurant there, where together with the great food, guests were able to drink the varying vintages all of which rachel assured me were excellent!
Dream Chasers 