Last night we had dinner in Vista, the Italian part of the main restaurant and had a pleasant chat with a couple on the next table. Go us for being sociable! This was aided by the fact they were from Cornwall and I didn’t have to strain so much to understand what they were saying. Because of my increasing deafness any accent north of Watford is an effort for me to comprehend. Chuck a mask on top and the fact I didn’t bother packing my hearing aid and for the most part it just sounds like a mumbled mess. Its nobody’s fault but my own. Interesting side note. The word ‘barbarian’ came from when the Romans first encountered the Germanic tribes and couldn’t understand what they were saying. To them it just sounded like sheep bleating hence the term and there is some similarities in what I hear or rather don’t hear. This may be an apocryphal story but I like it.
While having breakfast Lyn made an observation. We normally go to the dining room instead of the buffet simply because it’s a much nicer environment and I like the waiter service. Lyn said ‘Have you noticed there aren’t any fat people here?’ I replied ‘Present company excepted’ and pointed to myself. Disappointingly instead of saying ‘Your not fat darling’ she said ‘No I mean the very fat people. I bet they’re all in the buffet so they can load their plates up’ I looked around, she wasn’t wrong. Just to check we wandered up to the buffet… Yep theory proven.
We hadn’t booked a tour for Fuerteventura as nothing took our fancy and instead just decided to make our own way off the ship. I had a chat with Captain Steve, my new best cruise buddy, as I’ve now spoken to him twice which definitely means I WONT be getting an invite to the captains table. (They don’t do this on Marella so he would have been safe anyway).
I’ve come to the conclusion that the Canaries require a very specific tourist. There isn’t really anything here for people like ourselves who actually want to see things. There aren’t any museums or architectural masterpieces or anything of historical note that you can see. What there is is nice beaches and a sun that is bloody powerful when you stand directly in it. My bright red forehead can testify to this. So if all you want is a week or two in the winter sun and you can find a bit of shelter from the wind then this is for you.
Also there aren’t really any tat shops either much to Lyns chagrin. There are lots of statues. Everyone and anything seems to have a statue in Puerto del Rosario. I half expected a sculptor to jump out and knock up a quick one of me! (I would deserve it). At one point Lyn even thought she saw a tat shop which just turned out to be a statue of a pile of cushions next to a statue of some gaudily painted butterflies. If I could upload pictures I’d prove that I’m not making this up!
We had a walk around the town and even found an indoor shopping centre which disappointingly had a Claire Accessories and a C&A and still no tat. In the end we walked about 8 kilometres in all and then returned to the ship for lunch. It may be coming across that we’re not having a nice time but we are. We just need to embrace doing nothing more. It’s the sea day tomorrow so a perfect opportunity.
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