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Holidays 2004Puerto Del Carmen, LanzaroteFollowing the cultural whirlwind that was my trip to Amsterdam, a trip to Lanzarote for my 40th birthday celebrations and the hope of some sun soon beckoned. Undeterred by an earlier scare about an invasion of pink locusts to the Canary Islands, mid December saw us jetting off from Manchester airport. After a very bumpy 4 hour flight and a short transfer we arrived at our home for the week, La Penita Apartments in Puerto del Carmen. Our apartment (no 200) was great, huge room, all mod cons and even a microwave and coffee maker (luxury)! The location of La Penita appts is ideal, being set just a block behind the main 'strip'. The staff there were great even dropping off some chocolates for my birthday which Lisa enjoyed! A very nice touch we thought. Anyway after chucking in our cases we went in search of dinner and some drinks. After a very nice Italian meal we went for the first of many
visits to the Diamond Cocktail Bar. This is a great bar serving
all kinds of different cocktails, some in some very strange glasses
and all with sparklers of course! Lisa sampled the 'Erotica' cocktail
which as well as tasting like a delicious mint milkshake also
seemed to invoke strange magical powers of memory loss!, After
returning to the apartment later on that night we'd sat out on
the balcony drinking brandy videotaping our conversation. Lisa
remembered nothing of this until I told her about it the next
day. Amazing really as she seemed quite sober when we watched
the video back! I shoulda had one myself! The rest of the week was spent relaxing, sitting in the sun when it came out and the wind went down a bit! We walked to the old harbour area of Puerto del Carmen, which was nice, especially when viewed from 'The Red Crab' bar, which overlooks it, beer in hand of course with complimentary garlic bread. For my birthday 'meal' we went to 'El Charro', a favourite Mexican we'd visited numerous times on our juants to the island and our second meal there on this trip! As usual it was fabulous and rounded nicely off with some very large brandys. . A few other bars/restaurants of note that we visited were 'The Old Spanish Inn' and 'La Rounda' which were both great for breakfasts. The Lani's grill is also well worth a visit and its sister Indian restaurant. Not that authentic but tasty enough after a day's sunbathing. Amsterdam, Holland
Thanks for the snaps Jonathan...(kindly donated by he who had digicam and introduced me to fork cam!) West Coast of AmericaKendal, KeswickNot much to say bout this visit but that certainly doesn't reflect on how good it was. Very relaxing and peaceful was our base at the Castlegreen hotel. The Steam room, pool and restaurant were fabulous and the on site pub was great value, considering it was quite a way out from Kendal. I found out on the Fitz Park mini golf that I wasn't as good as I thought I was!! Still managed to get a short walk in up to castlerigg stone circle, which is actually older than stone henge. Watched the local cricket team on the Sunday afternoon.. howzat for a relaxing break?
Lindos, Rhodes Island, GreeceThis was our first trip to Greece and Lindos was so much like I thought it would be, quaint and relaxed but balanced well with a great nightlife We stayed at the the 'Lindos gardens' with its traditional Greek sugar cube apartments, ours had its veranda facing the Acropolis, nice. It was backed against the hillside and the dawn chorus or goats, dogs and cockerels ensured we missed none of the day. If you are into insects youd love it here all sorts of shapes and sizes and the crickets doing their noise thang all day! Still, at least you know youre on holiday when you hear their ribbiting. I happen to find it quite soothing unlike the mossi bites of which I had a fair few to suffer. Lindos itself (a short walk from the apartments, down a steep incline) is a maze of narrow cobbled streets and alleyways you get completely lost in. Lots of fabulous architecture, interesting nooks and crannies (but that's another story) and old Greek locals going about their day to day business as well as donkeys (the Lindos taxis! no cars allowed see) walking around the streets creating a truly traditional ambience... as well as hazardous if you get in the way of one! We stayed in Lindos all the time we were there as an excursion failed to run for some reason and spent the sunnier, latter half of our holiday on the beach in St Pauls Bay which was idyllic. Very quiet when we went, it had shallow waters which were perfect for snorkelling (till ours sprung a leak!). There is a small white chapel, which I pressume is St Pauls at the edge of the bay which was very popular for weddings, we saw 3 in as many days! Suckers! Mind you the wedding snaps would have a boss backdrop. Previous to our beach chilling (complete with cool bag with beer and lunch of course, the other beach wallers were so jealous) we spent a lot of the time just exploring the aforementioned crannies... All these tiny streets seemed to lead to the path that heads up to the Acropolis. This is the main focal point of Lindos high on the hill above the town and is well worth the climb. Even if you're not into history the views back over the town and into St Pauls bay are spectacular. Oh OK and some of the time was spent in the bars too, many of which were converted Captains houses, which have one tall room topped with a window so that Captains of old could see their ships in the bay... or so the story goes.. my eyes tended to loose focus after a few pints of Mythos, the local brew. Amstel was quite prevalent too but most beer came in bottles hmmm and in my humble opinion, rather too expensive anyway. The bar at the Lindos Gardens was very homely and the staff soo friendly, ideal for a night cap, especially after the walk back up the hill from a night out in Lindos itself!. In the evenings we tried the whole range of restaurants, many of whom had roof gardens with the stunning floodlit acropolis as their backdrop. Our favourite was "Il Palazzetto', an Italian near St Paul's Bay.. they even warmed up the Metaxa glasses so hey its gotta get my vote! "Symposis" was also very good and served a great Beef Stifado (ahem!). Others of note were "Stefanos" and "Mythos" (although the 2nd meal we had here wasn't as good as the first, thats what we get for going back).We were disappointed with the "Lindian Indian" though.. it isn't what you'd call an authentic Indian restaurant. We're curry connoisseurs though so hard to please. Hopefully it wont be too long before we get to go to Greece again.
Scarborough, North YorkshireA welcome break brought us to the windswept delights of Scarborough. Lisa was 21 for at least the third time so we thought we'd celebrate in style with true British grit against the bracing North Yorkshire weather. We stayed at the Derwent House Hotel (hmm nice paintwork) along with a gang of moped riders (all over the town they were). The breakfast's were top notch and set us up for a walk along the Cleveland way... not that we did as it was too flamin cold!! Shopping is always a good standby don't you think? and I ended up buying a pair of clogs from bjorn clogs, sooo comfy they are. We did get some climbing in though, McBean steps, at the side of the Grand Hotel kept us fit (178 steps I counted!) along with virtually everywhere else we went...Scarborough is not a flat place at all. We went for a curry in the Rupchanda, formally the Royal tandori on Queens St, which wasnt too bad but the service was very slow (which they apologised for with a complementary drink.hmmm). Frequented the Golden Ball and the Scarborough Arms and had a pint of 'Old Tosser' in Weatherespoons, which I thought was apt, considering. |
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