Smith's Journeys

We decided to treat ourselves to a week off, so we contacted a travel agent and booked a week in Tenerife through Tui Holidays.

The week after we booked, the holiday providers started delaying and cancelling flights. We began to get concerned when they then stated cancelling holiday destinations. It was an anxious few weeks wait to see if our holiday would be cancelled.

We were pleased to discover It wasn’t

To give some context regarding Tenerife. It has a landmass of 2,084 sq/km has a population of 966,000, with over 5 million visitors each year. It is situated 28 degrees north of the equator and 4 hours flying time from Manchester.

We drove up from Pradoe and got to Manchester Airport in plenty of time for our 5:45 pm flight, only to find that it had been delayed. The outcome was that we finally arrived at the hotel after 2.00 am.

The weather couldn’t have been better. There was a nice cool breeze which kept the temperature at a comfortable level. We got out and about to explore what the Island had to offer within the constraints of ensuring plenty of downtime either at the beach or beside the pool.

The hotel was fabulous

We felt like we needed a bit of action, so we booked a bike ride. This entailed a two-hour shuttle ride up to the drop-off point at the crater of Mt Teide at 2,180mtrs. We then climbed on two old-school mountain bikes and rode the 35km down to the sea. We left in the sunshine, down through the cloud and back into the sunshine, passing little mountainside villages before winding through narrow streets on the city’s outskirts to the beach.

The evening consisted of dinner between 7:00 & 8:30 pm, accompanied by a 500mil bottle of Spanish dry white wine. Returning to our suite to watch the sunset before heading down to the pool at about 9:30 pm, ready for a 10:00 pm start of the evening’s entertainment.

Each night was a different genre. We had the Two Tenors, Motown & Soul, ABBA, The Rolling Stones and the Bee Gees. They were all enjoyable in their own right.

On our last day, we took to the bikes again and cruised further around the island, checking out the beaches, views and local streets.

Then all too soon, it was back to the airport for another delayed flight back to Pradoe. We were expecting to be back in Manchester at 3:45 am and be able to get a few hours of sleep before getting into catch-up on the lawns. Instead, we arrived back at 8:30 am, bringing with us a freshly brewed dose of COVID.