Canary Islands
October 29, 2018
Travel is our primary goal while we’re living in Amsterdam. Even though I’m loving nesting and finding fun things to decorate our apartment, it’s really travel that we intend to focus our time and resources on as much as we can while we’re here. We took our first big trip to the Canary Islands last week!
James Wilson had the week off from school, and we decided we wanted to take a beach vacation since we haven’t been in a couple of years (we were too busy with the move to go this past summer). We did our research and discovered that if we wanted warm, sunny weather in Europe in the middle of October we’d need to head to the Canary Islands of Spain (located off the coast of Africa) because it’s already too cold in Croatia, the south of France, Portugal, and the mainland of Spain. Google told us that Grand Canary had the best beaches and most chance for sunny weather, and we used various websites (trip advisor, bookings, etc) to find our accommodations.
It’s always a risk when you’ve never been someplace and all you have to go on are web reviews, but we really lucked out. We ended up staying at the Cordial Morgan Playa resort, and it was absolutely perfect. The resort itself was great — just the right amount fanciness to make it feel luxurious, but not so over the top that we were out of our financial or social comfort zone. It’s perfectly located in the port of Morgan, which is a little touristy/fishing village. Going offseason was fabulous because everything was still open and welcoming, but it wasn’t terribly crowded.
We spent the week relaxing on the beach and swimming in the ocean (the water was cold at first, but fine once you got in). The first day we were there a lady saw me carrying on about getting into the cold water and she offered me her “lie low” (which is a raft) because it was their last day of vacation and they didn’t need it any more. I floated around on my cute little flamingo raft until I got acclimated enough to get all the way in. After the beach we’d spend a few hours in the resort pools, which were all heated. At night we’d stroll into the port for dinner (on Spanish time — dinner at 9pm!!)
James surprised us and rented a little convertible so we could explore the island in style. We took a (harrowing) drive up into the mountains. I spent the majority of the time worrying that a boulder would fall on our heads or that we’d careen off the road (zero guardrails) and plunge off a cliff, but I tried to relax as much as I could muster. We found a sleepy little pueblo blanco (we got there during siesta so everything was closed) but it was so fun to walk around the charming narrow, winding streets that reminded me of growing up in Spain.
One afternoon James and James Wilson hiked into a volcano but I decided to pass on that and I went to the spa instead.
We took a boat expedition and spent the afternoon snorkeling and relaxing on the sea. The color of the ocean was a deep, cobalt blue and perfectly clear. It was our favorite day for sure.
I’m so happy and grateful we got to take this trip together. I can’t remember the last time James got to go on vacation and not be half working the entire time. James Wilson laughed a lot and was silly and easy going and it made me so happy to see him so happy and at ease. We all got to really relax and play and experience the beauty and culture of a new place.
Yeah for Sunny Spain.
Looks like a great trip we’ve been waiting for an update on your blog. Thanks.