The Canary Islands: Flying in the Face of Covid

My forty-day trip involved both Silvio and the Canary Islands. The outside world was still struggling with Covid, but the Canaries were a kind of haven. We moved in a complacent bubble through historical villages and freshly painted hotels and poolside bars. We traveled to lush and beautiful La Palma and more rustic and traditional La Gomera, but mainly we spent our days on Tenerife. More

My forty-day trip involved both Silvio and the Canary Islands. The outside world was still struggling with Covid, but the Canaries were a kind of haven. We moved in a complacent bubble through historical villages and freshly painted hotels and poolside bars. We traveled to lush and beautiful La Palma and more rustic and traditional La Gomera, but mainly we spent our days on Tenerife. As we had on the other islands, we drove every road and path on Tenerife, returning to favourite spots until we began to recognize certain roadside stands and sudden clumps of green once we’d passed twisted rock left over from the Teide’s volcanic eruption. Before long we felt as if Covid hadn’t been a worldwide phenomenon but rather a transitory moment before we returned to what the politicians were calling life as normal.
The volcanic landscape was stark and surprising. Even in the barrancas, the narrow canyons which broke up the mountain slopes, barren rocky igneous fields were replaced by verdure-covered hills and sudden splashes of colour as odd birds darted amongst the trees. On the coast, the fungus growth of tourist hotels and resorts was capturing the best beaches, and the locals were driven increasingly up the hill where ancient pipes directed the scarce rainfall into village cisterns where it had once been equally shared. Agriculture was a thing of the past, and although we walked past banana plantations, we rarely found local fruit in the shops.
We talked to locals, heard stories from credulous tourists, and met refugees from the African coast a mere hundred kilometres away as well as other countries experiencing war and oppression. Like Singapore and Macao, the Canary Islands are a centuries-old crossroads for trade, and we were merely the latest guests to be castaways on its shifting shore.

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