Day 1: July 12

We got a beautiful blue car, a Skoda Fabia. We got in and drove off…. It was almost unbelievable. I hadn’t driven a car for six months! That probably sounds a little strange. But I really miss that feeling you get when you’re driving somewhere into the unknown...

First of all, as always, we stopped at a supermarket. We bought a lot of colorful aluminum cans of beer. We bought up all the kinds they had in the store — it came to 11 0.33-liter cans. We also bought white wine, bread, Spanish sausage, cheese, vegetables, and mango.

We drove to the nearest beach on the map to have a snack — check-in at our first apartment was at 2:00 p.m. The beach turned out to be very, very strange, in the middle of some industrial area. It was very windy. Huge wind turbine blades were spinning overhead. In the ocean, not far from the shore, there was some kind of structure visible, resembling a drilling rig.

Despite all this, there were quite a lot of people on the beach. There were even tents. There were caravans that were clearly spending the night here. I found it very strange. The place felt somehow not very cozy. We went down closer to the ocean, sat on the rocks, and started eating. We had the traditional empanada pastry — one with tuna, the other with chicken. And then we drove on.

The apartments were located in a beautiful house in the center of a tiny village 5 km from the ocean. A young guy came out to meet us; he was shy and spoke English poorly. But overall, it was clear that he really loved and was proud of his apartments. They truly deserved such treatment. Everything was done with taste and with love.

Perhaps the most telling thing is that the apartment had a fireplace. And in the fireplace, the firewood was neatly stacked. Volchiy picked up one log to take a closer look, and we realized that one end of each log had been polished! Just for beauty’s sake. And indeed, the polished end looked much better. The most magnificent thing about this apartment was the huge balcony. It was about 4 meters long and around 2.5 meters wide. On the balcony there were armchairs, a small sofa, and a table. The view was of a small square with benches, where by evening local old ladies began to gather. And in the distance (very far in the distance), a narrow strip of the ocean was visible.

The apartment owner prepared a small gift for us — a bottle of homemade red wine in the refrigerator and a plate of fruit. The Canary Islands bananas turned out to be simply divine. So sweet-sweet, like honey. And fragrant.

Meanwhile, I suddenly felt like sleeping…. The 3 a.m. wake-up was making itself known.

We had tea with fruit and cheese and decided to nap for an hour. Surprisingly, I couldn’t fall asleep for a long time, but then I sank into sleep…. And when we woke up, it was already getting dark…. But I no longer felt like sleeping.

We drank coffee (there was a moka pot in the kitchen!) and headed to the nearest beach.

The first beach in Tenerife was the biggest disappointment of the whole trip. I’ll say right away that beaches in Tenerife are generally a bit of a problem. I mean, they’re definitely not the kind I like…. But this one was simply the pinnacle of horror. Ugly buildings, either houses or hotels, loomed over the beach. (unfortunately, not a single photo.....)

(And again, jumping ahead, I’ll say that Tenerife as a whole looks kind of shabby. There are a lot of ruined or unfinished houses, and a lot of houses in poor condition. Because of this, the island gives off a messy impression. I often thought of Lanzarote. How beautiful all the little houses were there, all white, with green windows and shutters. And there were no such multi-story monsters right on the oceanfront on either Lanzarote or Fuerteventura, which really spoil the view…. Tenerife is very touristy and built up. And this development is often somehow chaotic, thoughtless, like plasterwork)

Despite the fact that we arrived at the beach around 7 p.m., there were tons of people, and there was nowhere to sit. Black sand, dirty murky water. In short, as Volchiy aptly put it, “This isn’t Mallorca.” And yes, indeed, remembering Mallorca’s pure, crystal-clear blue water, I even felt a little sad for a moment….

We still swam a little, and after drying off, drove back to our grand quarters.

For dinner, we had sandwiches made with local baguette, mozzarella, chorizo sausage, and tomatoes. Our favorite sandwiches, which we always ate on all the islands. With the sandwiches, we opened a bottle of red wine that the owner had given us. At first I didn’t like it very much. But it went down easily and had a pleasant taste.