San Andrés, a little village in the north east of La Palma

The little village of San Andrés is the sort of place that makes you think, 'Ah, now this is a proper Spanish village.' Well at least that's what we thought when we were exploring La Palma for a place to unpack our bags for a few years at least. So when we happened to encounter San Andrés which is the equal and opposite of an archetypal British village, it seemed a fair swap.

From falling in love with San Andrés as a place to live and falling out of love with it unfortunately took less than 30 minutes which coincided with a coach full of tourists arriving. Yes, apparently we were not the only people to have noticed the immense charm of this little place. And off we trotted to go and live one-fifth of the way up a mountain in what friends call our splendid isolation (with views). But of course this doesn't stop us visiting San Andrés to do our own little bit of tourism.

So what is it about San Andrés that makes it probably the most beautiful village on La Palma? Doubtless, the little cobbled streets flanked by a selection of curious old houses helps. Along with the whitewashed 15th century church, the Iglesia de San Andrés. Plazas with restaurants and the odd cheeky bar always help of course. Admittedly, there is no village pond but it does have the Atlantic Ocean at its feet which somehow offsets any feeling of being short-changed.

But what I think probably makes it stand out is the lushness of the place. If you take a look from afar, such as from Los Sauces the town above it, you'll notice a green oasis - this is San Andrés.

So what else is there to do in San Andrés apart from walk along the cobbled streets taking photos of curious old houses, visit the church, eat, drink and enjoy the views? Setting off over the highly pleasing and photogenic bridge  ...

... takes us to the sea pools of Charco Azul and then the beach of Puerto Espindola plus a few other delights along the way. And that's probably a good place to leave it until the next blog post.
Meanwhile, want to find out what we do when not playing hookey? Check us out at our day job - www.holiday-lapalma.com

Walking the Cubo de la Galga

Last week we walked the Cubo de la Galga, a high-sided gorge in the east of La Palma and the most prolific laurel forest in the Canaries.  A beautiful walk and now part of our La Palma Highlights Tour!
You can read our blog post about it along with photos at our other blog site which is dedicated to walking on La Palma :
http://gr130-lapalma.blogspot.com.es/2015/08/walking-cuba-de-la-galga-puntallana-la.html

Feria de Artesania San Antonio del Monte

  Yesterday was the big day for the Feria de Artesania San Antonio del Monte in Garafia, La Palma - a feria being a country fair and artesania meaning handicrafts.

Whilst there are a few ferias around the island such as at San Isidro, San Antonio is by far the largest feria as they make use of a sizable piece of land with a church plonked in the middle.  When I say 'the largest' I mean that over 2,000 people turn up to join in with the fun - coaches, buses, cars, motorbikes, caravans, walkers and lots and lots of people with tents! In fact, one year when it was a four-day event (normally it's spread out over three days), we made camp in our Land Rover for two nights. At the time we loved it ... but that was ten years ago :)

However, the main thing about both the feria at San Antonio and San Isidro is the cattle and other farm animals, namely goats and sheep. Plus horses, mules and those oh-so-sweet donkeys!

Roberto's Wall

Once upon a very long time ago ... so the legend begins  ...
I love those stories, don't you?  And La Palma has quite a few legends as you would of course expect of an island 'cast adrift from mainland life.'  The legend of Robert's Wall (El Pared de Roberto) does not disappoint as, in the best of traditions, it involves a young couple deeply in love.
Now as we all know, young couples in love will stop at nothing to be together.  Which is just as well because Roberto and his young lady rather inconveniently lived on opposite sides of the island.  Not to be thwarted however, the two would make the long and arduous journey to the top of the island where they met in a secret lover's tryst.
The course of true love never runs smoothly though and imagine poor Roberto's anguish when, arriving at their rendezvous point, he discovered an impenetrable wall blocking his path.

In desperation, poor Roberto called out that he would give his soul if he could reach the other side.  Only silence followed.
At this, Roberto rather rashly bettered his offer with a promise of both his body and soul if he could pass (he was after all very in love).   At that, the devil heard him and Roberto was immediately engulfed in a ball of flames and burst through the wall, disappearing to his death.
The next morning, his young lady was found laid dead.  Her body was taken to the Roque de Muchachos and laid to rest.  And to this day, the gap in the wall remains.

If you would like to walk through Roberto's Wall, you can find it by walking between the Roque de Muchachos and the Mirador Andenes.  If you don't want the sort of long walk that takes body and soul, then approach it from the mirador end from where it will only take you about ten or fifteen minutes to reach.  Although there are several smaller walls in the area (must have been a busy spot in the old days), Roberto's wall is the most impressive and just to make it crystal clear, it is marked with the sign, 'Pared de Roberto.'

Not only will you be able to appreciate the size of the wall which even today springs up abruptly as if from nowhere but the views on a clear day are beyond awesome.