Bayuyo, second visit

When we first time went to Bayuyo, the old volcano nearest our village, we went with a group of other walkers, lead by a guy who knew exactly how to go. As I said before, you can hardly miss it, so the idea was to make use of his knowledge for least painful approach. This Sunday we went with kids, believing that we remembered the way. In reality, we didn't - we missed a turn somewhere and went along a different path. Surprisingly, it worked out somewhat better than the path our guide used. The problem with his route was that for a while there was no path - he probably cut a bit of distance that way, but walking across extremely rocky malpais is not my favourite experience. On Sunday, almost as soon as we realized that we missed a turn, there was a path leading in the right direction, with some cairns along it. We took it, and it lead us directly to the path that runs around the caldera.

El Barranco de Los Molinos walk

Yesterday I went for a nice longish walk organized by the center for adult education where I take spanish lessons. There was a goodish group of us going, mostly spanish-speaking students who are taking subject other than spanish (well, for sure). Unfortunately, our own classes shrank dramatically by the end of the year.

Anyway. It's a nice, mostly level and very easy walk, starting at a small hamlet of Las Parselas. From there you first go to the dam and reservoir of the barranco (ravine). From there you go to the bottom of barranco and proceed to the sea level at Los Molinos, even smaller place of about two buildings; one of them being a restaurant. Once you located the dam it's impossible to get lost.

 The barranco is supposed to catch the rain water and the reservoir to hold it; unfortunately, this winter there was no rain to speak of and the water level looks very low. Below the level of the dam, what water there is in the bottom of the ravine is the one that filters through the earth from the ditches that come from the reservoir. There was very little of this water yesterday, which was good from a walker's point of view. Probably not that great for anybody else though.

 Those horses observed with no interest whatsoever as we started on our walk, unlike the dog from the same farm. It barked and barked, but funnily, stayed beyond the symbolic line of his territory provided by the low earth barriers. The pic is somewhat overprocessed; the original taken against the light.

More pictures below; including one of a dead goat. You've been warned.

Oasis Park Fuerteventura - birds of prey and Botanic garden

A bit more about oasis park. As I said, there are three daily shows on, out of which we only saw only the sea lions, the first one. We missed birds of prey and reptiles; but of birds of prey we did catch one interesting bit, which came after the show was over.
The birds of prey are kept in a distinct bit of park , the botanic garden, which is separated by a row of eroded hills from the main territory. To get there you need to walk about 1.5 km (according to their pointers), or catch a "jungle bus" - converted van, with rows of wooden seats. It keep shuffling to and fro between the main bit and the botanical garden, turning up at both "terminals" every ten minutes or so, so there shouldn't be a problem. Definitely wasn't a problem for us - we rode three of us both ways in a vehicle meant for at least ten times as many people. The Botanic garden is on a steeper slope than the rest of the territory and mostly contains cacti and succulents (makes sense really). There is also a lake with crocodiles (search me) and the bit where they demonstrate the birds of prey, more or less on the top of the garden. When we get there, there were very few people still sitting around, and a member of staff standing in the middle, looking at the sky and holding up something raw-looking (a piece of chicken meat, as I saw later from the photos)

Oasis Park Fuerteventura

Last week we went to Oasis Park with my sister and her daughter. There are a few useful bits of knowledge that I got out of this trip.
First, most important, and something I didn't realize before - they run their own free bus service from all major resorts on the islands. The schedules are on their website. I am not sure if it ever gets so busy that you can't get on to the bus, we got on with no problems both ways. Free daily bus service means that you don't need to book the trip, you just get on the bus and pay your entrance fee at the park. "Last minute" travel company gives you a tiny discount - 1 euro per person - but takes a deposit, which ties you in a way; knowing about the bus you an just go whenever you like.

Of course, you can also go whenever you like with a car.

Entrance fee is 24 euro adults, 12 euro kids up to eleven. However, if you are canarian resident, take you residencia paper with you and you will get in for 14 euro, kids 7 - much bigger discount than with last minute travel, I wish somebody mentioned it when we were booking.

There is one drawback, or what we thought was a drawback, with buses - they bring people in the morning, and take them back in the evening, in case of Corralejo at 6pm. When we arrived and realized that, we thought, oh no, how are we going to spend seven hours here. However, it proved to be easy - the territory and variety of animals is quite large, there are cafes serving quite reasonable food, and there are a few (three at the moment, normally four) animal shows during the day, of which we saw only one. As a result, we didn't even quite finish looking around the park, and there was no time at all for checking out an enormous garden center attached to it (sob, sob, I have to come back)

Buddha's Birthday

Went to Milton Keynes to see Buddha's Birthday celebrations at Buddhist's Temple by Willen Lake. I won't pretend I understood the ceremony, but the location, the season, the temple, the gardens around it and the atmosphere were all very agreeable. Never been to Milton Keynes before and still can't say we've been really, what with the temple being on outskirts, but we liked the small part that we've seen







various UK photos on shutterstock

those eyes

battling with enormous energy dip, went shopping. it helps, yes.

They had birds of prey charity display at scotsdales garden center, as they often do on weekends. This owl was sitting on a glove of the handler. When confronted with the eye of the camera, it got agitated and tried to fly away - unsuccessfully, of course.

I think he was bothered that somebody (or something) had even bigger eyes than himself