July 31 – Portimão, Portugal – supposed to be Tangier, Morocco

Weather – 27º

Steps – 6,387

good morning Portugal

When we planned this trip 2 months ago, we thought we’d be waking up in Africa today, instead we are in Portugal – actually not very far from Africa, but still not Africa. I’m the last one to begrudge a lazy morning, so I revel in a slow morning with no alarm set. In a few days alarms will be plentiful.

Travelling requires a lot of flexibility. Flights are delayed, bags are forgotten, ports are changed etc. I have never had a cruise port changed that has really gotten me into a knot – that being said, I’ve never had a port changed that I had my heart set on. I think we have the luxury of youth-ish allowing us to

revisit or replan anything that goes sideways. March 2020 – we thought we’d be in Bali, India, and Singapore…we all know how that turned out.

Anyway…point is…when we planned this trip, we thought we’d be in Africa on July 31, but instead we are in Portugal…I’m not sad.

I’ve done a bit of research on Portimão, and it doesn’t seem like there’s much to do here actually in the town. Today’s excursion was supposed to take us out of Portimão and into a couple different towns. That is until we decided to blow off the tour and enjoy the ship.

We spent the morning hanging on our balcony where it was glorious - warm, but

not too warm, breezy but not too breezy, so we thought…let’s keep doing this.
This cruise has been so busy, we’ve haven’t had much balcony time. Plus, often when we want to be out there it’s bathed in sun and heat…today was perfect.

Dinner tonight was at the ship’s steak house. The ship has 4 restaurants - a main dining room, an Italian (last night), a steak, and a French. The steak and French are by reservation only, reservations can be booked months ahead and are super popular…we don’t understand the hype. These places are good for a

kinda big menu

change of scenery, but the main dining room is where we like to eat. The menus change each night in the main dining room, so it’s not like you eat the same thing night after night. However, if you do want to eat the same thing night after night, they have an entire menu of things that don’t change.

We couldn’t get a reservation for the steak or French before we left home, but yesterday thought we’d try to see if anything was available. Sure enough, Monica in reservations found us an open table. I’m sure they hold a few open tables each night, but we like to think Monica pulled some strings for us. Monica was one of the staff here who recognized us on the first night of this cruise and greeted us by name. I think she remembers us from Chris’ retirement cruise, I don’t think we saw her on the ship on the Brazil cruise at Christmas,

good night

even that would be impressive…but from 2020…WOW!

thanks Regent!!

I also had to do some shopping today. We had some onboard credit left. We used some on a tour at the beginning of the cruise, but I never want to leave here with money wasted. Shopping onboard Regent ships isn’t great, I got enough moisturizer and lip balm to last a life time or at least until we’re on board again at Christmas.

July 30 – Day at Sea, Northern Atlantic Ocean

welcome to the ship

Weather – 21º, not too bad for sitting outside,

our usual, plus Nawaz

especially when the sun poked out

Steps – 5,420

Without any reason to get up until 10:30, we lazed around for the first bit of the day. Last night when I (Chris spent some time, not money this time, at the casino) arrived back in the room, Vandana (our room attendant) left us some sweets...which I assume she intended for our breakfast…haha! I’m sure she didn’t, but I popped one in my mouth last night and had another 2 this morning with an espresso I made for myself with the in-
room maker.

Some rooms have these makers depending on the

breakfast tray

room category. We’ve had rooms with makers before and somehow, they are just too hard for me. We have a Nespresso, which I have become expert at, but these…too hard…it has turned into Chris’ job…that’s fine with me. Espresso and fudge aren’t my typical breakfast, but why not??

room service breakfast

Each cruise has a gathering of repeat guests. We had one earlier in the cruise and another one this morning – this morning’s gathering was for those of us who have been on for more than 200 nights, we
have 293 nights. There used to be more advantage to accruing nights. The best perks for us were that after 200 nights we got unlimited internet for unlimited devices AND included laundry. The internet is still a perk, but now laundry is included for everyone. Regent cruise line is all-inclusive, so everything is paid for in the cruise fare…excursions, drinks package, laundry, gratuities, even flights (but you can get a reduced fare to book your own) so really there is little we can think of (if they asked us) to incentivize repeat bookings. This is where the gathering of repeat guests comes in.

one of our TV channels

About 50 of us gathered in one of the ship’s lounges for a Spanish brunch…tapas and sangria. It was nice. By far the best thing about Regent cruises are their staff. I mentioned Nawaz, and today I met a new food server from the Philippines, Jackie who chatted with me about how to make the Spanish custard dessert. She said they make similar ones in Philippines and proceeded to describe it to me. This NOT in her job description and I wouldn’t have noticed if she hadn’t, but she did and I definitely noticed…lovely!

Next it was more chores for us. Apparently, the tour we selected for tomorrow in

Portimão is sold out, so on to our second choice – we had hopped we could have selected a second choice when we submitted our request, but nope…have to try again today. We got our second choice.

typical sea day

We had planned to have a “Cool-by-the-Pool” cocktail before lunch but opted for a glass of wine on our balcony. It was windy (windy enough to close the upper deck) and cool – sadly not that kind of cool. Today’s “Cool-by-the-Pool” entertainment was provided by the ship’s piano player. The piano players on each cruise are a bit of a draw for us (as are all of the musicians) – we are suckers for a cocktail over a bit of live music. The current guy is a bit of a disappointment – I HATE to be critical, he obviously can play, but plays to what seems like a karaoke accompaniment and his singing is just not

Italian al fresco, windy, but lovely!

good. We’ve been entertained by some fantastic, engaging players who are also great singers…this guy is not one of them…too bad…entertainment options on these small ships are kinda limited to begin with. 

Although we were hardly hungry after our morning tapas, by the time 1:30 rolled around we figured we had better get a few veggies into us, so we headed to the lunch buffet for a salad.

Tonight’s show was Flamenco and violin…awesome!

tonight's menu

I didn’t take make (as the guides seem to say)

more Italian

photos today, so included some ship shots. One of them is our best friend Nawaz the bartender I mentioned in a previous post…he has continued to be terrific!

I also added a shot of my typical room service breakfast order.

July 29 - Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, Spain

cross atop Sana Cruz last night

full bus, but still got a row each

Weather – 26º, not at all humid, cooler (21º) and very
windy at Agüimes

Steps – 6,224

We woke up in the beautiful Las Palmas container port. This is not the first container port we’ve been in and likely won’t be our last. Container ports are a not-so-desirable factor of being on a cruise. It’s really no big deal unless you want a bit of a balcony sit with a beautiful view before the ship sails – this is more Chris’ problem than mine, as I typically hunker down for a nap while Chris reads outside.

container port

Today we had a pre-nap chore ahead of

San Sebastian Church

us. We learned yesterday that we are not longer going to Tangier, Morocco and will instead be going to Portimão, Portugal. Something about complicated immigration if we leave the EU…I can’t see that this is new information that the cruise wouldn’t have had long before yesterday, but who knows.

monument to St. Sebastian

Lots of people on here were more disappointed than we are about the itinerary change. We were on a sailboat cruise in 2006 that stopped in Morocco - a long time ago, but crossed off the Morocco, Africa list. Plus…you can never be set on a cruise itinerary…something’s bound to change due to weather, political situatio

pretty deserted

n, the Pope vacation bombing our time in Lisbon…lots of factors.

Anyway…our morning started with a drive through Las Palmas learning as usual from the guide. Las Palmas is the capital of the Canary Islands, actually shared with Santa Cruz as the

Coffee Nelson

capital - the parliament changes every 4 months. We first stretched our legs in Agüimes, a medieval town in the southern part of the island. We did a short walking tour to see the church, a hotel courtyard and just wander a bit…I think we counted about 10 people other than those of us on the tour…apparently no one lives in the historical centre…or does business, or anything – it was a bit odd, cool little town, but oddly empty. 

wind mills everywhere

Next, we visited a museum dedicated to the Guanches people, prehistoric inhabitants of Gran Canaria, who once made their homes in caves. Here we learned about daily life of these people – one of the biggest things of interest is how they got water as it is not readily available on the surface.

VERY narrow, windy roads

Some people still live in these caves. 

Lunch was a traditional tapas Canarian lunch at a local restaurant –chicken wings (for the first time this trip), and other tapas offerings, including the mojo sauce we learned to make yesterday.

surf

Some of the roads up the hills/mountains are so narrow, they are only one-way. I’m not sure exactly now each car decides, but at one point a car headed to us, had to back way, way up so we could pass. Our guide got out to stop all other traffic.

Once back at the boat, we decide (over a Coffee Nelson) between the options for tours at Portimão and settle on a trip to caves (they seem to be a theme on this cruise) only accessible from the sea.

July 28 - Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain

last night - off the African coast

Weather – 27º in Santa Cruz, 19º in San Cristóbal

random cool shot from Laguna

de La Laguna 

Back home, I anticipated melting throughout the entire time we were in Europe. I’ve been hot a few times, but no where near melting – the trip’s not over, but so far, the weather has been great! Today, in the small town of San Cristóbal de La Laguna it was actually cold. The temp was about 19º, it was windy with some misting. 

Steps – 14,754, Guillermo, our guide, was

La Laguna convent

new bus with a missing seat!

impressed with our step count for the day. Of course, we had to brag that just a few days ago in Barcelona we were over 22,000!

 Today was a big day for touring. We scheduled ourselves for 2!

The highlight of today’s touring is a mojo picón making workshop. Mojo picón is a traditional Canarian sauce. Before the workshop, we drove around Santa Cruz de Tenerife as the guide gave us info about island life. At one point, I thought the small bus we were on was having a bit of difficulty and sure enough,

mojo lesson

it was. What should have taken us 15 min to get to San Cristóbal de La Laguna took us about 30. Eventually we made it. We went off with the guide on a walking tour and the bus driver took the bus in for a swap.

San Cristóbal de La Laguna is a small

Chris in an apron!

colonial town 2000 feet above sea level, which is why it is so much cooler than Santa Cruz at the sea. We only wandered with Guillermo our guide for about 40 min, until the bus was back.

Santa Cruz sculpture

The mojo workshop was a lot of fun. It took place at a winery which we toured first. In fact, before the tour started, we had a glass of sparkling wine with some tapas…this was an apology snack from the bus company…nice. We’ve had mishaps with buses in the past and they never said sorry with wine.

Hands on tours are rarely offered and when they are, we rarely take them. We weren’t quite sure if it would be an actual hands-on activity or a demo – this was both. Mojo picón is a sauce served as a garnish for all sorts of dishes here in the Canary

Santa Cruz monument

Islands. We tasted it with boiled potatoes, and bread. Ingredients for the sauce typically include bell peppers, medium-hot picón peppers (called puta madre peppers, which is Spanish for MFing pepper – the woman from the winery telling us about the recipe called them this mater of factly, kind of acknowledging that it was a curse, but not really), paprika, garlic, almonds, and cumin. We also paired the sauces with local wines.

We got back to the boat around 2:00, just enough time to clean up, chill for a bit, and head out for the evening’s walking tour and tapas tasting. This tour (with Guillermo, the same guide as in the morning) was conducted entirely NOT on a bus. I have to say, this cruise’s tours have been light on the bus time…15 min to this local, 30 to the next etc. Not a lot of time for a bus nap, but that’s fine with me.

Santa Cruz cathedral

I always love a walking tour. I prefer to experience a town or city close up rather than from behind the window of a bus. I see the benefit of the bus tours of a city, but walking gives you more of a sensory experience…the smells of a bakery or the sewer, the rain on your face, or the sun on your face…all the while dodging people, pets, and cars.

Anyway…this evening’s tour had us strolling

cool winery interior

through the Plaza de España - a square centered around a Spanish Civil War monument. We stopped at the 19th-century Teatro Guimerá, the oldest theater in the Canary Islands – the Canary Islands seems to have a lot of ‘biggest, oldest, deepest in the Canary Islands’. The guide stopped us in front of a 16th century church for a bit of a chat.

We finished the evening at 2 local tapas bars where we sampled tapas (including the mojo sauce) and local wine. Yesterday Chris and I were chatting about the lack of basic tapas since we’ve been on

local cider

the cruise. On cruise tours, we’ve had ‘fancy’ tapas…these have been good, but we’re longing for the Barcelona tapas we had…tomato bread, cheese, dried meat, olives, calamari, croquettes. Tonight, we had some basic-ish tapas. I realize I am spoiled to be able to nit pick the tapas I’m eating.

more monuments

July 27 - Arrecife (Lanzarote), Canary Islands, Spain

Canary Island flag

Weather – 25º, little humidity, lovely

Manrique crab sculpture

Steps – 8,563

This the first time to the Canary Islands for us, all I know little about these islands is that they are part of Spain and are close to the north west coast of

Africa…time to learn. One thing I have learned is that these islands are about as south as the southern most part of Morocco and northern part of Western Sahara. The first thing we learn from Jon our guide, is about César Manrique, an artist from here who influenced the many things on Lanzarotte, the island where we are today.

not exactly hard to figure out

Driving to our first stop, Jon pointed out sculptures in the middle of round-abouts and architecture influenced by Manrique. I’d never heard of César Manrique, apparently there is a museum of his work here, unfortunately we don’t have time for this. I could do with a museum visit…we haven’t had one yet on this trip.

Atlantic Ocean

Our first stop is to the Jardin de Cactus Manrique created. This place is called a cactus garden but is more of a cactus museum. There are some MASSIVE cacti here – incredible. There are thousands of specimens of cactus from around the world here…very unique place. After wandering, and admiring the cacti, we had time for a refreshment…beer and a sangria…I ordered all in Spanish…not super difficult, but I was very proud of myself. Jon told us to be sure to use the washrooms…they had Manrique art indicating which was for women and which was for men.

Our second and final stop was at Jameos de Agua also designed by Manrique. This place is an 8km series of lava tubes or caves

cacti!!

that the La Sorona volcano created. We see a few huge caves and some of the pools in these caves.

very charming

These pools are sea water that rise and fall with the tides and are home to tiny albino crabs, less than a cm in size. We can see some of these, but apparently there are thousands!

It seems as though we arrive right at opening time as there is a massive line to get in. After about 30 minutes the crowd disappears. Fortunately, we breeze past the line with our guide.

Canary Island refreshments

There is a restaurant built into one of the caves and here is where we eat lunch of squash soup,

cave and pool

Slow cooked pork with sweet potato purée with a chocolate cake for dessert, all of this was sashed down with wine. The food was good, but nothing special. We paid extra for this tour, so I was hoping for a bit more from the food. It was a very unique place to eat in, that was for sure!

We returned to the boat around 3:30 for

outside the caves

a siesta, blogging and the usual boat evening.

Manrique road sculpture