Visit to the Coastal town of Garachico

Some evenings when I need some fresh air, I like to go for a drive to the picturesque town of Garachico.

As soon as I see the big rock in the middle of the sea and a long promenade along the seashore, I get ready for my niece to stop the engine and walk with me on the promenade..

Further down the path are the amazing natural pools carved out through the rocks (which resulted after the volcanic eruptions in 1706), making it a safe place to swim with tropical fishes.

There is even a mini children’s park where kids can play after the swim.

Garachico was once a port where ships anchored but this port was completely destroyed during the volcanic eruption. However the castle with the stone doorway of ‘San Miguel Castle’ still stands there at the end of the promenade. This is the finest building, a 16^th century stronghold belonging to the Count of Gomera’ that survived a volcanic eruption in 1706 unscathed.

Further up, there is a natural beach with black sand and more rocks where people can swim and fish too.

Garachico is a beautiful quaint town with rustic houses. It is very Spanish in Character with narrow, cobbled streets with cars parked on the one side of the road. It is still arguably the least spoilt coastal area of Tenerife.

During festivals, the balconies are dressed with a certain theme, for example you will find them dressed up promoting products of the village

There is a plaza in the center of the town where people can enjoy the traditional cuisine with the glass of local wine or with the tiny cup of Cortado (strong coffee)

After a short drive I come back to Icod de Los Vinos, to sit at my brother's store at 'Teban S.L.'  at Calle Sabastian, also known as 'Bazar Hindu', My brother has lots of tourist visiting our store to buy souvenirs and electronic products to take back home. I love too talking English with the tourists, which is a welcome change from speaking Spanish all day with other local clients.

Walking down the Promenade

The sun is still visible behind the thick light brown clouds; the cool air from the sea makes it a pleasant walk. Sun normally sets at 9:30pm, the big open space is full of people, out for fresh air. There are few shoppers too and there are many souvenir shops surrounding the plaza. On weekends there is a big crowd of tourists and locals, watching the street puppet show. Its 6:30pm summer time; I am walking down the street called Martinez in the town of Puerto de la Cruz.

On my right I see a tourist holding two parrots in her hand, the photographer speaks to the parrots giving them some instructions in Spanish The parrots obey and one stretches on her one arm, pretending to sleep, while the other parrot lifts its head giving a peck on her cheek. The photographer is satisfied on striking a deal.

The path is broad and clean, lined with palm trees. There used to be motorway many years ago but now it is renovated and converted into a walking plaza. This strip of promenade has no traffic at all, sea front on one side, with small inlet with stone seats and row of restaurants and other souvenir shops lined on the other side. 

There are some artists who will paint or do caricatures from a live model or just from photographs.

The fish tanks on my right distract me and I walk closer to have a look and I see some tourist having their fish pedicure done in one stall. There are many more such tanks and I am tempted too. But no, it’s my evening walk, some other day, perhaps.

As I walk further, I see a couple dancing. They are dancing on a live music. Many restaurants have spread their furniture outside in the open space where people can sip their coffee or enjoy the Canary Island meal, as well as enjoy the fresh sea air. I sit down and order coffee and enjoy the vocal music that the artist is singing, some old numbers of the eighties. I sit longer to hear some more of this music before I get up to continue my walk.

The end of the path opens to a large beach of black sand. It is actually an artificial beach with sand imported from another island. This is the best place to relax and watch the waves, and the people at the beach and the beautiful view the other side.

There used to be a large water fountain here which use to light up with colorful lights, but today, there is shortage of water, or electricity or recession perhaps.

I sit relaxed on large wooden seats, watching the sun as it sets slowly, coloring the sky to pink, then dark red and finally disappears behind the waves of the sea leaving behind the dark shade of blue..

Potato chipstixs

My co-bloggers and I, we walked on Lavasa promenade, whiling away the evening hours, watching the sun set, clicking pictures in Bollywood styles, freezing the smiles under Sayadhri hills when suddenly we were distracted by the lady at the far end, leaning against the railing facing the lake. She was eating spiral potato twister.

“Hey… What is that”

“let’s go there to have a closer look”

“I think it some kind of kabab on skewers”

“I dare you to go and try her stuff” I said thinking it would be fun if she dared. We were in crazy mood and R went halfway, had a closer look and came back.

“Nah!” she said, “Let’s go and buy it, I am sure it might be available some where on the promenade, there are some kiosks down there.”

And so we walked back towards the kiosk ‘Twisteez’, ah there it was. We watched in amazement as the chef took one large potato, poked a skewer through its belly and put it in the chopper. The potato auto-rolled on its skewer chopped by a sharp knife into a spiral shape. He submerged the spirally chopped potato into the fryer and voila.

A chipstix - fried potato with a twist.

“What flavor you want?” said the chef.

“Dried mango flavor”

“No, let’s try mint powder”

“How about mixing all the different flavors”

Confused, we decided on just salt and pepper

The aroma of the potato heightened the hunger pangs. Potato has a universal admiration from young and old alike. There is no reason to watch the clock or the diet when a lone potato stares at you. I plucked a tiny piece from the skewer and dropped into my mouth.

Hhhmmm! Yuummmmm!! Always the best!!

The crunchy piece melted in the mouth after a soft bite, coating the tongue with salt and peppery taste.

“I wanted more of that chipstik, actually all of it, maybe I should order one more? Huh?”

But the diet clock whispered at the back of my mind “Stop, you just had your lunch one hour ago, beware!”

‘Lavasa Women’s drive’ I was there too..but for a different reason...

Without women, this world wuld be a boring place

When I got an invitation from ‘Lavasa Women’s Drive organized by Lavasa in collaboration with the Times of India’ to celebrate the spirit of modern woman, telling me that my opinion counts, that people care to read what I write, and that there is someone out there listening to me, many random thoughts flooded my mind quizzing my position in cyber arena. I was elated with a false sense of pride for this achievement, thinking that I was filtered out from million of bloggers for some unique reason unknown to me and I happily debated with a bloated mind….thinking.. .. I am a strong woman, I am good blogger, I occupy the popular position in the social world, my writing has weight, bla, bla, bla....duh!.... My ego was in the fourth gear, speeding shamelessly. I wanted to share this news with all the people I knew. I was bragging near everyone who cared to listen, till I discovered the real reason behind this event and the seriousness of this ‘Social Cause’

This event was not about me or my ability to write......

‘Lavasa Women’s drive’ was about the creating awareness for early detection of breast cancer in women….

A message with responsibility……

“OVERTAKE BREAST CANCER”

I was bribed into this event with the perks to cover this event as chroniclers of Lavasa Women’s Drive.  (Which I could easily have blogged for free,) since this is the ‘social cause’ very close to my heart, having lost my 3 aunts in a row and missing them terribly even now. But this bribe was no ordinary one. Besides giving me an opportunity to get free screening for Breast, Cervical and Oral cancers at Tata Memorial Hospital, it would also allow me to enjoy the new city called ‘Lavasa’ free of cost. (a place that I was planning to visit since a long time, and had neatly tucked aside twenty grand for this purpose).

I realized that I had a responsibility of posting my message across that screamed loud and clear that ‘Cancer is curable if detected early’. It was an event to help promote women empowerment.

So, on 27th February 2011, when I reached the venue.....

I discovered that there were very large crowd of women who, like me, cared.

I woke up early at 5:30am (which is quite rare) to be at Bandra reclamation grounds that was bustling with positive energies. There were 350 cars participating in the Rally from Mumbai and (I was told) 150 more from Pune. Every car had a message to share.

It was all about saving the girl child and promoting women empowerment.

Comfortably, we drove for 5 hours, in a specious Inova, following the participating cars, cheering the women drivers and their girl-co-passengers on route whenever we overtook their vehicle (they had a map and certain rules to follow. Later, eavesdropping at the promenade, I heard one woman speak about her fright at speeding at 140) We drove through express highway, some 211 kilometers, via Lonavala, Hinjewadi, Pirangut, driving up through western Ghats, behind the majestic Sahyadri Mountains, along the contours of the Warasgoan Lake to reach a complete new world, a planned city of Lavasa, a city with an European crown.
 

Warasgoan Lake

Once there, the atmosphere was emotive.

Women, women, everywhere.

A carnival of music and dance.

Many of the women enjoyed one day carnival and headed back home but me and five other bloggers (two bloggers went back the same day) along with the members of windchimers, discovered the blogging world as we exchanging our stories of the virtual world in the luxurious service apartments where we spend the night as room-mates. Twenty fours hours ago, we were strangers but forty eight hours later, we were blogger buddies who had exchanged stories worth more than thousands of words.......

On the first day, we walked down the promenade, meeting participants and asking about their experiences

All the women were having fun, dancing and singing.......

And bloggers were communicating in their tweeting world. The virtual world were kept abreast with all the events and happening by live tweets of @shaaqT, @anushankaran, @ideasmithy, @monikamanchanda @kiranmanral and @Cemonde

When they were not tweeting, the enthusiastic bloggers would go yakkiti yakkiti yak yak, making interesting comments, sharing their views of their blogging world, it was the best time ever for me. Thank you girls….you were sooooo very adorable.

Although there was much to see, our one-day-stay limited our tourism. We did drive up to Ekkant retreat which allowed me to commute with nature and we visited a bamboo factory called Bamboosa where I purchased a hand crafted walking stick. But apart from that, we just walked up and down the Dasve town, discovering the European architecture and the scenic natural waterfront. (I was told that there is Nature Trail, Christel House, Xthrill, Boating, plant Nursery, convention hall, and adventure tourism which offer camping grounds, rock-climbing, para-surfing, and other water related sports like jet skis, catamarans, motor and peddle boats, fishing and pool volleyballs.

The city was clean and refreshing, steps and potted plants everywhere, with hundred of steps to climb up and down the hills but unfortunately there were no railings anywhere, (I think they forgot that senior citizens and handicaps need support during climbing up/down the stairs) Being hilly city and easily accessible by road, many would also like to cycle around but there were no lanes for cycling, all the paths lining the driveway were filled with flora and fauna (which looked pretty, no doubt about that) but a thought for a lane for mountain bikers would be appreciated (anybody listening?)

And surprisingly, being an Indian town, there were no beggars! Strange!! But that must be because there were no traffic signals. Not as yet! Hahaa!

It is hard to believe that it’s an Indian city, easily accessible to every Indian, with no visa requirement. All one needs is just a desire to stay with the nature, away from the maddening crowd and screeching horns of busy streets.

Just few hours away by road from Mumbai,

A city of dreams where there is sound of music in the air...

I am motivated to go once again.

Maybe I will,

if travel bug bites……..under my tapping feet.

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Co-bloggers who also travelled with me and then blogged
Anuradha one more and more
Kiran
Nisha, one more
Idea Smith, one more
Shakshi
Monika
Shakti
Lavasa Blog