Masca & Puerto

I have Spanish classes here at the Don Quijote school, a sister-school to Enforex where I spent my first week.  That would take up all my weekdays, meaning that today, being Sunday is my only chance to go further afield.

It was a tough choice between going to Masca or Teide (the highest mountain in Spain).  The former involved a 1h20 bus ride followed by a 30 min bus ride.  The latter only had one bus a day, or join a pricey tour on weekdays.  So it looked like that decision was made for me so I set off to Masca around 1000 by bus.

There was a bit of confusion with the bus schedule when I waited on the wrong side of the road.  I nearly gave up thinking that the bus wasn’t till much later.  Fortunately I corrected my understanding and crossed to the correct side of the road just in time for the tedious multi-stop journey to Bellavista del Norte where I waited briefly for the connection to Masca.

The first bus ride did give me a good idea of how built up Tenerife is, with plenty of villages, farms (lots of bananas), motorways and smaller roads near the coastal area.  The second ride on a half-size bus gave me an insight into the mountainous heart.  The road was scarily windy and narrow, often requiring us to stop or reverse to give way to opposing traffic.

From the bus stop at Masca, I wandered uphill and downhill to enjoy the view in either direction.  I was hungry but there was nothing open on a Sunday, not even toilets.  With that and the bus schedule in mind, I was on the bus back to Bellavista del Norte after an hour.

At the station there, I had a light late lunch before taking the bus back to Puerto de la Cruz.

Text continues after this gallery.

Back in Puerto, I explored the entire waterfront by foot.  There were plenty of restaurants my end of town and also at the far end, but not so much in between.  There was a huge swimming pool/lagoon on my end of the waterfront and some sheltered swimming areas closer to the other end.  I took dinner at the far side of town before returning to base for the night.

The weather Puerto de la Cruz seemed mild.  It was hot in the sun but pleasant when clouds were around and cool when there was any wind.  I would later learn that this was the cooler wetter side of the island due to the prevailing winds and the Teide mountain in the centre.

The south is much warmer and drier and preferred by the sun-seeking Brits (and  the beaches there are better too).  Quite strangely, the continental Europeans, especially Germans prefer Puerto de la Cruz despite the weather and the lack of good beaches.  I now recall the weather difference between the north and south coasts in Gran Canaria where I was a few years back too.