La Palma 2006 - Arrival

From Worldtraveller

This was my third trip to the Canary Islands. Getting from London to La Palma in one day always means a ridiculously early start, and to get a 7am flight from Heathrow I had to sleep on a sofa in my office - never a pleasant experience. Then I battled through appalling queues to get through security, and once I'd fought my way through the airport and onto the plane I was treated to Iberia's truly appalling in flight 'service'. Sincerely, I will never fly Iberia again - they are essentially a no-frills airline but which happily charges full-fat fares, and even when someone else is paying for my travel, I utterly object to paying €2.50 for a can of coke when the plane ticket cost €500. Next time I go I will either get the boat from Cádiz, or fly via Marrakesh with Ryanair and Binter.

Pico de Teide, seen from the plane to La Palma

Once I was on La Palma, though, the journey got massively more fun. I picked up a hire car, and set out on for the summit of the island, 38km away up an extremely twisty road. On my previous trips I'd got taxis to the top, and had seriously struggled not to throw up as the non-stop hairpins taken at speed induced extreme car-sickness, but I soon discovered how great it is actually driving up a road like that. I swung into the corners, taking a racing line whenever possible, and went heavy on the power to speed out of them, while listening to some great tunes and enjoying the views of the distant sea dropping ever further below me. If I'd had a passenger, they'd have been hurling out the window within a few minutes.

My two previous trips had both been at the height of summer, in August 2001 and August 2003, so I was expecting some less clement weather for this October trip. But the weather was ideal when I arrived, sunny and clear and with a fantastic sunset over the sea of clouds which the peaks of the highest islands stand above. When it got dark the sky was bright and full of stars. I wished I was observing straight away instead of doing the normal thing of arriving on the mountain top a night in advance.

Clouds drift past the Isaac Newton Group of telescopes in the late evening light

Sunset over a sea of clouds

Waves in a sea of clouds

La Palma 2006: Arrival / Wet nights on the mountain top / Around the island