Karaoke?

Small Bougainvillea in Puerto de la Cruz

In our ongoing efforts to embrace Tenerife and life here, we decided to take a short trip ‘up north’ and back to Puerto de la Cruz. Despite Captain Clarke’s earlier derogatory remarks about my ability to drive a small car, it was, in fact, his suggestion. (I should point out at this juncture that he was not best pleased about my observations on his accident record. Apparently, hitting the wall, hitting the rose bush, the gates, the pillar in France, the garage door and a variety of other inanimate objects, are not accidents. If they are not accidents, they must be ….) Anyway, back to our trip to the north. On the way there we discussing where we should go for lunch neither of us could remember a lunch venue that was memorable! That is a sad indication of the state of our memory, or a sad reflection that although we really enjoyed the holiday in Puerto de la Cruz, we maybe didn’t find anywhere that we regarded as memorable!

Rough Seas

On arrival in Puerto de la Cruz we were also reminded of the dreadful parking situation – there is none! It is really, really difficult to find a parking space in the town. Eventually, Captain Clarke made the excellent suggestion that we go to the Hotel Botanico, (where we had previously stayed and where there is almost always parking available), and park there. We did that and walked into town. Whilst still pleasant, the weather in Puerto de la Cruz was notably cooler than the south. The state of the sea reflected this and was distinctly rough. Talking of rough, we did bump into the lady from up north that we had encountered on our last visit – she really did put the ‘r’ and the ‘u’ into rough! She was telling us that she had been to Barcelona a week ago to see her son who apparently lives there. (Why she was telling two complete strangers on the street, I have no idea!) She was explaining how she was, “proper sh**ing it”, because she hadn’t flown for 9 years. Apparently she drank a bottle of wine and two ‘brandy coffees’, (I suspect she meant ‘Carajillos’ but she may not know the Spanish word for it!), before going to the airport where she was told to eat mints before approaching check-in because she stank of booze. Rough? You bet she’s rough! Am I a snob? In this particular instance I would be proud to be!

Rougher than a rough thing!

One thing that I have not mentioned to date is that this week is carnival week. I have largely not mentioned it because we have seen no signs what-so-ever of the carnival. Apparently, it is primarily centred on the north of the island anyway with Puerto de la Cruz and Santa Cruz being the prime locations.

The Harbour was Calm

There is some elements of carnival here in the south, but the lady was telling us that the parade started the other night at midnight and went on for some hours – we are hardly likely to see that!!! In Puerto de la Cruz, however, there were signs all over the town of the carnival and it all looked very jolly indeed. Having walked around the town a little, bought some aftershave, (very, very cheap in the particular shop we went to and seems to be good quality … we went to the same shop last time we were here), we stopped off for some lunch. Captain Clarke had his usual large gin and tonic whilst I stuck to the tonic.

Carnival in Puerto de la Cruz

Having had lunch we got a taxi back to the Hotel Botanico, (€3.15), and started our journey southwards. We did stop off on the way as I had to attend a conference call, but we made it back to the slightly warmer south. Captain Clarke, by this point, had reported feeling shivery and suspected a cold coming on. I felt slightly nauseous too, so we returned to the hotel for a quiet rest. At about 8pm we decided that we really should go out for dinner. Captain Clarke had taken some pills by this point and was feeling a little better. I was still suffering from the nausea but we came to a compromise that we would go to a tapas bar we had seen where Captain Clarke could have a couple of tapas if he wanted and I could just have a small tapa.

More Carnival!

We wandered down the street to the tapas bar we had seen. It is opposite a bar claiming to be ‘The Best Bar in Tenerife’. The tapas bar turned out to be rather naff, we couldn’t see anything that we would want on the menu outside the bar, and it all looked a bit tired and not terribly clean. We decided to give it a miss. As we walked back up the street to try and find something else we passed ‘The Best Bar in Tenerife’ where a man was singing, (I use this term loosely!). I commented to Captain Clarke, “Oh, they do Karaoke there” – it turned out I was wrong! He was the paid act!! Truly dreadful!!!

An elegant serving of ketchup!!

We eventually came across an ‘Aberdeen Steak House’ which seemed to offer a variety dishes ranging from very large, (t-bone steaks), to small bowls of pasta and similar. Captain Clarke said he wasn’t hungry so just ordered a fillet steak with bearnaise sauce, chips and vegetables, I had a bowl of penne arrabiata. Now, I don’t like to stereotype, but looking at how the tomato ketchup and mayonnaise are served, where on earth did Captain Clarke think his bearnaise sauce was going to come from?! I have to be honest and say that the meal met my expectations. Captain Clarke’s steak had been overcooked on a cold grill so that the meat took on a tough texture and a rather unpleasant, (iron), taste. His sauce came from a jar somewhere that wasn’t expensive to buy! My pasta was overcooked, contained pieces of meat, (which is interesting for a dish that is usually vegetarian), and would have made Lidl proud! It was, in fact, the first bad meal we have had in Tenerife and we won’t be going back there!

This morning the hotel has installed a new Wifi system, (well, presumably they have brought someone in to do it!). Nothing, and I really do mean nothing, could be worse than the old Wifi! It was dreadful and so unusable that I always tethered to my iPad in order to write my missives. (I would have tethered to my iPhone, but that runs out of data allowance in about 20 seconds, but that’s another story!) So far, it seems that the new Wifi is better. I am using it now and it seems to be quite good. The only issue is that I don’t think many guests know about the change, so it may slow down once a few more log on. We will just have to wait and see. It really shouldn’t be difficult to install a reliable Wifi service in this day and age – it is, after all, RudyMenTerry!