Let me start by saying just how thankful I am for all the support I got for my first post.
Starting a blog was a long process for me because...I don't really like people who are not my close friends to know too much about my life.
But I do see and experience and learn such amazing things all the time and I started to feel that MAYBE I could start a positive change in someone's life. No matter how small it might be. And so we start with high hopes :)
After reconsidering many topics that I want to cover I went for the one that my gut feeling was telling me to write on. It is a bit scary for me to write about it (you will see why), but I go by 'scary is more often good than bad'.
SO! Prepare Yahself for a bunch of beautiful photos and some pondering on the self.
The story goes like this: I live in a super small village and there is a smaller city not so far but nothing really happens here. Unless you know people that are having crazy house parties. Which I don't. Yet. So in order to have fun one needs to go a bit further. No problem for me!
Last week it was the Winter Solstice and I saw that there is storytelling workshop in Brenja Baja about how Guanches, the indigenous people of the Canaries celebrated Solstice. There was also a concert in the same city and so I decided to go there.
My lovely friends from the farm - Tanja and Halel AKA my family for the past month (together with Stef, Eduardo and Maja) did not feel like going so I had to go alone. Bahhh. Again? Alone? Will anyone talk to me there? I felt emotionally drained and wasn't sure if I want to go or not. But I really really did not feel like doing the same ol' - hanging out, film and then sleeping. It was time for action. I pumped myself up with some HC hip hop and trap, put some nice clothes and make up on and I felt like a queen ready to conquer to world. Baaaam.
It was already quite late when I came so I missed the stories but I came just in time for the party. After saying hi to people I knew from the last time I was just buzzing around not really knowing what to do with myself. And then I heard the music. OMG.
The DJ was just superb!! I came up to him and I was like: "Yo dawg, this shit is niiiiice! (Oye hombre, me encanta esta música!)". And so I made my first friend of the night! 😄
Listen to this band!!
We danced and danced and then I wanted to see the concert down in the city. Daniel (the DJ) said he would love to go with me, but he has to stay to play music.
But I can take his car and go drive myself there.
WHO DOES THAT?
The amount of kindness and friendship and love that I find in the people in this island strucks me all the time. So long story short, I was joyriding for a while, listened to the concert, met another super nice guy in the kitchen and then went to sleep in my sleeping bag because I was dead. It was 1. Yes, I changed a lot in 2017. 😇
The next day I took it easy, walked around the neighboring city, ate some delicious tropical fruits and then randomly decided to go the southernmost point of the island - Fuencaliente.
Fuencaliente is famous because it is basically surrounded by volcanoes. Which means that the soil is very nice for vineyards.
Llanos Negros and Los Quedamos, ash from the volcanic euroption of 1677
And so here I was, a sunny day and I am walking over three volcanoes. The last eruption from the volcano of Teneguía happened in 1971. And you can really see that the landscape is still fresh!
Cute German couple holding hands and walking barefoot
♪🔥This girl is on firee🔥♪
So I was completely alone in this amazing place. And it hit me. Being semper solus is really not that bad. Most of the time is completely wonderful. You just have to pull through the hard sticky part.
But the beauties were still to follow:
I decided that I would not be going back home that night. It was time to unfurl my sleeping bag beneath the starry sky. Alone. I did battle with myself for quite some time:
But is is so dangerous.
But it is so beautiful.
Home is nice and safe and you have a bed.
Home is boring. Home is known.
I could not decline the calling of the ocean. And sitting on that beach and taking in one of the most sensational sunsets in my life I knew I made the right choice. I took a walk around the lighthouse and discovered the natural salt pans they have there with many many salt pools from which they extract salt by hand, the artisan way. The sunset lasted for almost an hour and the sun beams were reflecting in the salty water. I was all alone. And utterly happy.
View from my bed
I couldn't fall asleep for a long time. Every time the breeze blew I wanted to check if there is someone coming. But it was midnight before Christmas Eve. There was really nobody there. I talked with myself for some time until I felt peaceful. You cannot be afraid all the time.
In the morning I met a nice Norwegian guy (his name was something like Thjorm) who slept a bit higher in the volcano and we shared a cup of cofee in Fuencaliente under the sun of a very different Christmas Eve. Later I went to the famous flee shop in Argual, bought myself a new book in Spanish to read and a couple of adventures later I was back home cooking with my friends and sharing a lovely meal and then watching Fight Club for the first time (yaaaay! What a great film! Helena Bonham Carter <3).
And then on Christmas I told my family what I did the day before. They were not happy. Not happy at all.
You are stupid. You will never do that again. You are not that poor - just rent a room for God's sake.
And I told them: look, I am being honest with you. And you can choose. Either you can accept me and not yell at me but look this a bit more constructively. Or I can omit and lie about what I do. It is your choice. But the fact that I am a woman will not stop me from living the life I want to live.
Do I need to be careful? Absolutely. And I definitely can upgrade my level of self-protection. But that is something I am working on, rather than crawling up in the warmth of the narrow space that we sometimes dare to call 'safe'.
And I would really love to discuss this! I mean I am really just mentioning the top of an iceberg of female-solo-traveler-problems here (really), but I would love to write more about it when I get more courageous.
Sisters what are your thoughts? How do you handle this situations, both with yourself and your loved ones?
To end on a happy note, this was my Christmas:
Hiihii! :)
Oh, and P.S. please send vibes for me to have a nice NYE. We are going to the local fiesta to dance to the music of DJ Juan. I have no expectations whatsoever haha.
