Up we go

Alien tentacles! Cthulhu raising to the surface! Tremble, you feeble humans... etc

When I went up the Mount Teide two years ago I didn’t really have a plan. Well, I had the most basic of all plans — to go up and survive. People told me two things at once — first “it’s kinda easy, you just need to pace yourself” and the second “but the altitude sickness can strike even the most fit people”. With this mixed message in mind, I can tell you I was going up listening to myself and asking all the time “am I ok?”, “am I still ok?”. I was perfectly fine, but this type of self-monitoring is not conductive to enjoyment.

This time I knew it was doable, and my first concern was the weather. What if the (blasted) calima turns up again? We won’t be able to see anything!

I can say straight away that we were much luckier this time — there was almost no dust in the air and the visibility was a lot better. First day, we saw Gran Canaria, La Palma and La Gomera above the sea of clouds while still on the bus. Next day, only La Gomera was visible from the top of the mountain at dawn, but that was also fine — I personally didn’t even get the camera out of the backpack, see the explanation later.

Ascent of Teide

The summit of Teide is small, so there is only a limited number of people who can fit.

This summer started well for me — I went up Teide, the tallest mountain of the Canary Islands, Spain, and the entire Atlantic basin. Sounds impressive, right? Though of course, as mountains go, it is not that huge — under 4 km. Still, I have never been anywhere over 2000 metres before, so... I am really quite pleased with myself and with the way it went.

It was all a bit sudden. I was studying the Arawak webpage for a while, thinking that maybe one day I should do it, while we live here on the Canaries. When on a walk with Arawak, I spoke to our guide about the indicated level of difficulty (3+/4 out of 5, that’s pretty high). He said that in his opinion I had nothing to worry about, level-wise, but that if I wanted to do it in June, I had to book immediately, because there were very few places left (like, two). I nodded along, still undecided. Later, on the bus back to Las Palmas, he fiddled with his phone, turned to me and said “You know what, I’ve booked you just in case. You can always cancel it”. That was a «волшебный пендель» (magical kick in the butt that speeds you along), and the end of my hesitations.

Inagua, the empty one

Some of the remaining old pines. Apparently, they grow in a very very uniform conical shape up to a certain age; after which they start to spread into an umbrella at the top.

I have refused to drive in the mountains on Gran Canaria ever since I got stuck on the pass of Degollada de las Yeguas on our way from Fataga to Ingenio. Having learned to drive in East Anglia, I prefer my roads straight, wide and flat; here I prefer to be driven. However, local public transport, although overall excellent, quite logically doesn't go where there are no people to carry. So some of the areas to the west of the island remained unexplored by me till this year, including some of the protected areas, such as Pilancones and Inagua.

Psychoactive plants illustrated

Inspired by Josep Lluís Berdonces i Serra’s Guía de las plantas psicoactivas, here’s our own short guide to ten common psychoactive plants and one famous psychedelic mushroom. It’s just a sample, you understand. Click on “more photos” links under each image to get more Tamara’s pictures from Shutterstock.

1. Amanita muscaria, fly agaric, amanita matamoscas, мухомор красный. Main psychoactive compounds: muscimol, ibotenic acid.



Fly agaric (more photos)

fly-in sunflowers

I rarely put my lensbaby on camera, which is a shame, but explainable by the fact that I tend to shoot with image stocks in mind and they are somewhat suspicious of unusual effects. but this sunflowers asked for it, I think.

Timur's attitude to posing is normal for majority of kids and many adults I know - that is, once you point your camera at them, they make a face (they won't describe it as making a face, but that's what it is). So to make him to change his expression to something more natural, I had to tell him something funny, which was "nobody expects the spanish inquisition!", and produced desired effect