Geoff Jones

Inveterate dabbler in business, travel, gadgets & life

Category: Personal

Tenerife & La Gomera Walking Holiday

1-IMG_5495Sally and I decided that it was about time we gave the two wheels a rest and give the  Scarpa boots & Leki poles an airing 🙂 Sally’s criteria was it had to be warm and hilly! Since Mr T would only allow her two weeks of and it was November we came up with the Canary islands,  particularly Tenerife and La Gomera. So of we flew with Easyjet from Gatwick. Only to discover on arrival that Ryanair passengers from Stansted were collecting their baggage in the airport 🙁

A quick taxi ride (€30) and we were at the docks and straight on the awaiting ship (€56 each way) making it a smooth passage to our apartment in San Sebastian booked a couple of weeks ago on booking.com. We booked the rest of the accommodation as we went, invariably the night before we arrived (Yep, I’m that organised).

The walking & weather were excellent every day with some days outstanding like the walk down the Masca Valley & Las Poyatas to El Cedro (here is a cool site with trail lists)

Here is a table of all our walks with links to the GPS/GPX tracks we did and my photographs:-

2014 DatePlaceHotelRoute gpx (Strava)Photos (G+)Steps (Fitbit)Miles (Fitbit)Ascent feet (Fitbit)KCals (Fitbit)
Mon 3 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to El Cabrito45 Pics3112114.2723204247
Tue 4 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to La Casetas loop62 pics3120014.3121803861
Wed 5 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánGran Rey to Arure74 pics2255510.3433503116
Thu 6 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to Laja via GR131-Stage180 pics2672412.2536704334
Fri 7 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánHermigua El Cedro loop70 pics2599711.9230703583
Sat 8 NovTenerife - Santiago del Teide La Casona del patioExplore TF65 around Santiago del Tiede43 pics2567611.814003549
Sun 9 NovTenerife - Santiago del Teide La Casona del patioSantiago del Tiede to Masca Beach91 pics2625912.0414405007
Mon 10 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorWalk to cable car onTiede
Tiede walk below summit		80 pics150476.96607394
Tue 11 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorCircular walk below Tiede50 pics2703112.413604771
Wed 12 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorHike up Tiede to top station of cable car
Portillo information centre walk		46 pics2526511.5945104168
Thu 13 NovTenerife - San MiguelHotel RuralRoques de Garcia loop102 pics2743212.5826603775
Fri 14 NovTenerife - San MiguelHotel RuralSan Miguel - The Camel trail82 pics3287515.084404568
Sat 15 NovTenerife - Golf del SurRoyal Park AlbatrosLa Laguna town walking45 Pics182128.353502909
Sun 16 NovTenerife - El MėdanoFlight homeMontana Roja64 pics166467.658502918
Totals934 pics352040161.52826058200

I can recommend the island for walking & don’t be put of by the horrors of Los Cristianos / Playa de Las Americas ( where I ended up renting a car to make a fast escape) & Los Gigantes. The beaches behind the airport are excellent & quiet. The local bus service is also good although the first buses don’t leave until 10am from San Sebastian.

Here is the story according to Google+

Lazy day in Tangermüde

1-IMG_0162The only biking today was pedalling around the corner to take it into the Gerike bike repair shop to get the front light re-fixed after my small accident, actually they put it on in a much better position,  and also to see if they could reset the rear derailleur as it has started to move two gears at a time etc. Tomorrow will tell if they have succeeded! Although I’ve now downloaded the bike repair app as recommended by DC Rainmaker 🙂

1-IMG_3732It was a glorious warm sunny day so it made sight seeing very pleasurable, combined with the vast numbers of bakeries, ice cream cafes & pubs which made it into a big weight gain day. No wonder there are so many tubby folks around.

I discovered all the little bits sticking out in the river that so fascinate my sister back home. My only theory is that they narrow the river thus making it flow faster and maybe deepening the navigable channel but really I have no idea. Here is a picture of what she means, any theories welcome in the comments!. [my good friend Christopher found the answer in this paper “The effect of groynes on rivers”

In the evening I went for a massage at the Schloss hotel, bit pricey and I find it interesting that their order of doing the massage is the reverse of Sally’s whose I still very much prefer.

Tomorrow I continue down the Elbe – only about 400km to do now…

Some pictures of the day are here.

 

Cycling the Elbe & Vitava rivers

Over 4 months later and I’m back here 🙂 Although I notice over 40 folks a day still visit the site to check out my Scarpa boots posts etc.

D-Route10_gpxMy next little bike trip is now planned and I leave next Tuesday to get the overnight ferry from Harwich to Hook of Holland it’s 70 miles to the ferry but I might just let the train take the strain for that stretch.

After the ferry it’s a four hour or so bike ride to the main station in Amsterdam to catch the overnight sleeper to Prague. Arriving in Prague early Thursday morning ready to cycle the Vitava & Elbe rivers to the North Sea at (probably) Brunsbüttel after this I will probably do the additional  216km to Esbjerg in Denmark to catch the ferry to Harwich. This has to be before September 29th as the ferry ceases to operate afterwards 🙁

According to my Bikeline books it’s 500km from Prague to Magdeburg and then 500km more from Magdeburg to Cuxhaven (on the left bank) and pretty well downhill or the way so somewhat easier than the Sportivs that Sally has me doing here in the UK 🙂

I must give a special shout out to Øivind Langeland and his bluacciaio.com blog for all his positive remarks about my biking the Danube posts. It was great to follow him following some of my route 🙂 maybe next year we can do some of the Iron Curtain Trail. together.