Day 13 - Lanzarote, Canary Islands

Lanzarote is one of the smallest of the Canary Islands. It’s location is 100 miles west of Africa yet only 50 miles from end to end and it belongs to Spain. There is no water on the island nor are there any mountains. This is an active volcanic islands. Roughly every 50 years they have a significant eruption (last happened in the 1970’s) which helps to grow the surface of the island. The most significant eruption lasted 6 years and buried the nearby town 300′ below the current surface.
          

Amazing what beauty can be created when it never rains. This island also has nothing it produces, other than a very small amount of wine. Money comes from tourism. When younger kids go to school they can go into the tourism sector or head to a university in a different country. Often if they pick university they will never return to the island because there is nothing waiting for them upon their return. When the parents die each child is offered their land in hopes they’ll cultivate it. Most do not take the offer and the land returns to the country. As a result, as you drive this island, you see HUGE swatches of land sitting untouched.

Dolphins chasing along side the boat? It’s bound to be an amazing day		Rolling out the red carpet for us?
1970 lava flow cut a house in half

Cesar Manrique Foundation (house)	Cesar’s art and vision had a significant oversight of how this country looks	A fig tree is growing through one of the broken lava tubes
	Cesar was an artist who bought this home in a worthless area because it had 5 broken lava tubes touching
He turned each of the tubes into a functional meeting / lounge area
Even managed to turn one into a pool	There are no mountains, only previous volcanic mounds. Some have begun to collapse in on itself

Monumento al Campesino winery	There are strong northeast winds from the Sahara so they’ve built windblocks from lava rocks to protect their grapes	All over the countryside are windblocks like these to shield the vines so they can produce wine
There are so many underground broken lava tubes and everyone builds inside them for shade, wind protection	And they build these places with such beauty	Not sure how I’d feel about my house backing up against a lava mound

Timanfaya National Park (site of the 6-year volcanic eruption)	Everyone gets to see how hot the earth still is here. The guide places a small sample in each persons hand they collect from a shoveling in the center of the pic	It’s typically 110-120 degrees. I dropped mine instantly
Next a demonstration how quickly the magma chambers are heading the area	Within 20 seconds of placing the kindling on the cliff it explodes into flames	Final demonstration, pouring a little water into the earth
Countdown 3, 2, 1…		A restaurant here uses a chamber to cook all their meat
An idea how steep this hillside is	Collapsing lava tube	This wall use to be part of a tube but the top has caved in and we can drive through
The same spot as the last picture to give an idea how deep this tube is	Under this soil, 300′ down, is a town, covered up, similar to Pompeii

Mirador del Rio	1600′ straight up from the coast

Jameos del Agua Another great example of using this 5km-long tube. It gets its name from the blind crabs found in this lake		Tranquil place to sit and enjoy a drink
A section is even used a natural theater	I wish they’d let you swim but it’s off-limits

What a treat today was. If that wasn’t enough to finish the day, upon arriving into the windjammer for lunch, I see a sight I’ve never seen. Unlimited lobster tails. Usually this is reserved for formal nights only. Tonight it just happened to be the “chef’s special”. Needless to say my luck with dolphins remains in tact.

Tomorrow – the next of the Grand Canary Islands