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Saturday, January 24, 2015
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Adios Fuerteventura, it's sort of been good to know you
This is the end beautiful friends….actually no beautiful or otherwise friends left behind. I did however manage to score a few points with the more senior citizens due to my limited internet skills. A lot of them received tablets or IPhones for Christmas and no clue as to how to use them. I don't own either one of those but I've learned from kids, the computer won't go kaput if you try different buttons which is what I mostly do until I strike "gold" maybe more like copper actually since the internet at Ambar Beach is anything but reliable. Here are a few parting thoughts on the island in case any of you ever want to venture this way.
We walked the beach to Jandia on Wednesday. Jandia is the main shopping hub for many tourists who happily want to spend their euros on perfumes, bags, shoes, cosmetics and the like. The Canary Islands are a tax free zone hence the cheaper prices on those expensive items. The day of the walk was one of the nicest days we've had here although the walk itself was a bit arduous. The beach does have lovely yellow, powdery sand but it's been greatly eroded in many parts and one then has to walk on volcanic rocks of various sizes which litter the beach. Once in a while there's a clearing with sand but mostly you're walking on rocks till you get to the beach at Jandia which is a beautiful stretch of sand with no obstruction to speak of. The weather was so nice I thought I might give dipping my toes in the ocean another try. Unfortunately I wasn't wearing a bathing suit. Decided to go in any way in my black undies and beige tank top, not too many people around plus wouldn't really care if there were. It wasn't much of a swim, the water was quite cold and the darn waves were pretty freaky. At least I can say I went in the ocean twice if only for short yet sweet periods of time. Significant other didn't go at all, too scared of a little cold water. On the parts of the beach where volcanic rocks are found in abundance, people have built semi-circular fortress like structures of varying heights to ensure privacy for some nude sunbathing which is highly prized by Germans, not too many French appear to indulge, they're more modest I suppose or like us they don't like to expose their naked, older bodies.
Regarding the all inclusives, one week here would have been enough. There really isn't much to see because it's so dry and overall not all that pretty. I feel we got to see the prettiest parts. The weather which was meant to be quite reliable did not turn out that way. We had a few good days at first with a few good days in the last week of our stay. The wind is unrelenting, some days it was so strong it made walking actually difficult. This endless wind can be very tiresome indeed. Overall the food was good but it was seldom hot. We found the microwave on the last day of our stay. Deserts were not great except for flan, perfect since I don't believe I put on any weight. There was a young team of animators all French speaking which did its utmost best to provide entertainment throughout. We didn't participate in anything because that's the way we roll, we don't enjoy having a great time especially when heavy socializing with other people is involved. (haha) In any case kudos to them they really try their best. The pools outside were beautiful but I only got one dip in them, frigid is an understatement. The pool inside was cold, water was never warm or heated like the brochure stated but I was able to do my laps most every day. We didn't play ping pong or squash never got around to it, you had to rent the rackets for 20 euros a shot and I never had any money on me. The t.v. was beyond bad, only slightly better reception than the one we had in Cuba. It was quite hilarious you could be watching something or other and all of a sudden the whole screen would freeze with a statement in Spanish saying: "El signal es deb ill" debile in French means moronic, it was moronic indeed. Of course we were able to catch CNN and BBC with their endless droning on, they don't just attack a topic they pummel it into the ground till it's blown to smithereens. I was exhausted merely listening to them. There were hardly any Spanish stations, the whole experience was a bit weird in that it barely felt like we were traveling in a different country where the lingua franca was Spanish. I did my best to try and use my Spanish,didn't make any improvements.
Today it's grey and there's even a little misty rain. We had to check out of our room at noon, took a local bus to Jandia to get some money, now it's just a waiting game. It's going to be a long, long day and night. Adios for now hope you enjoyed my blog.
We walked the beach to Jandia on Wednesday. Jandia is the main shopping hub for many tourists who happily want to spend their euros on perfumes, bags, shoes, cosmetics and the like. The Canary Islands are a tax free zone hence the cheaper prices on those expensive items. The day of the walk was one of the nicest days we've had here although the walk itself was a bit arduous. The beach does have lovely yellow, powdery sand but it's been greatly eroded in many parts and one then has to walk on volcanic rocks of various sizes which litter the beach. Once in a while there's a clearing with sand but mostly you're walking on rocks till you get to the beach at Jandia which is a beautiful stretch of sand with no obstruction to speak of. The weather was so nice I thought I might give dipping my toes in the ocean another try. Unfortunately I wasn't wearing a bathing suit. Decided to go in any way in my black undies and beige tank top, not too many people around plus wouldn't really care if there were. It wasn't much of a swim, the water was quite cold and the darn waves were pretty freaky. At least I can say I went in the ocean twice if only for short yet sweet periods of time. Significant other didn't go at all, too scared of a little cold water. On the parts of the beach where volcanic rocks are found in abundance, people have built semi-circular fortress like structures of varying heights to ensure privacy for some nude sunbathing which is highly prized by Germans, not too many French appear to indulge, they're more modest I suppose or like us they don't like to expose their naked, older bodies.
Regarding the all inclusives, one week here would have been enough. There really isn't much to see because it's so dry and overall not all that pretty. I feel we got to see the prettiest parts. The weather which was meant to be quite reliable did not turn out that way. We had a few good days at first with a few good days in the last week of our stay. The wind is unrelenting, some days it was so strong it made walking actually difficult. This endless wind can be very tiresome indeed. Overall the food was good but it was seldom hot. We found the microwave on the last day of our stay. Deserts were not great except for flan, perfect since I don't believe I put on any weight. There was a young team of animators all French speaking which did its utmost best to provide entertainment throughout. We didn't participate in anything because that's the way we roll, we don't enjoy having a great time especially when heavy socializing with other people is involved. (haha) In any case kudos to them they really try their best. The pools outside were beautiful but I only got one dip in them, frigid is an understatement. The pool inside was cold, water was never warm or heated like the brochure stated but I was able to do my laps most every day. We didn't play ping pong or squash never got around to it, you had to rent the rackets for 20 euros a shot and I never had any money on me. The t.v. was beyond bad, only slightly better reception than the one we had in Cuba. It was quite hilarious you could be watching something or other and all of a sudden the whole screen would freeze with a statement in Spanish saying: "El signal es deb ill" debile in French means moronic, it was moronic indeed. Of course we were able to catch CNN and BBC with their endless droning on, they don't just attack a topic they pummel it into the ground till it's blown to smithereens. I was exhausted merely listening to them. There were hardly any Spanish stations, the whole experience was a bit weird in that it barely felt like we were traveling in a different country where the lingua franca was Spanish. I did my best to try and use my Spanish,didn't make any improvements.
Today it's grey and there's even a little misty rain. We had to check out of our room at noon, took a local bus to Jandia to get some money, now it's just a waiting game. It's going to be a long, long day and night. Adios for now hope you enjoyed my blog.
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