LA PALMA

Husb had done his homework and was totally organised by arranging to hire a car for our day on "The Beautiful Island" that is La Palma, so after the 247 nautical mile sail to Santa Cruz de la Palma we picked up Hector-the-Corsa and off we went. Literally. There were no licence checks or car inspections (needless to say, I, took several photos of Hector).

We drove -oops, Husb drove, down to the south of the island to Fuencaliente 

where we visited the 

TENEGUIA volcano, 

which, amazingly, last erupted as recently as 1971 making it La Palma's youngest volcano. It was interesting to see the signs of new life growing in the bottom of the volcano in comparison to the dried, burnt areas outside where the lava had overflowed.

The drive back was scenic, and included an impromptu stop at a roadside doorway advertising Pizza (we should have known it wouldn't have been very nice) but it was so sunny we sat by the roadside for an hour (and watched the ship tour bus drive past)

We could see Mount Teide on Tenerife in the distance.

Teide looking like it is floating on a cloud.

Once again we grabbed a couple of hours of sun on deck before leaving the ship and going back into town to raid the Benetton sale, buying 6 items for £20. Bargain.

Tropical Night. Favourite Dress. Comes on EVERY cruise.

I took this because I couldn't tell where the sea stopped and the sky started.

It was all sooooo SKY BLUE.

Great day. Stroke of genius by Husb to hire Hector. Calm sea. Benetton Bargains. Fave Dress. Sun.

Smashing. 

MADEIRA

It was actually a very enjoyable day in Madeira. 

We began the day with walk along some of the Madeiran Levadas which are irrigation canals taking water from the wet, rainy, misty areas of the north island to the drier, sunnier regions of the south. The whole network is 100km long and makes very pleasant walking. To say it was a "guided tour" was a bit of an exaggeration as the guide didn't say a word, but it was very nice and the banana cake was magnificent. 

We ended up at CAMACHA, the wickerwork centre of Madeira. It is also believed to be the first place where football was EVER played in Portugal (though not necessarily  by Ronaldo's great great grandparents) so Husb posed accordingly.

Basketware is popular in Madeira but even this skill is dying out now. I spotted a cute basket elephant!

And then it was down to the serious business of replenishing our stocks of Madeiran wine by a visit and guided tour of BLANDY'S wine lodge.

The barrels were massive.

Winston Churchill liked a tipple of Blandy's vintage wine...

and Princess Margaret received a crate.

We all sampled the Verdelho grape and the Malmsey grape..

and they were delish.

We had time for a walk around Funchal, then back to Braemar - it really is a pretty island.

We had a bit of sun on deck which was a bonus. 

Love how all the appartments on land are sun-facing - it looks like there's hardly a spare plot of land.

Tropical Evening and we were all hungry. Must have been the Blandy's making us hungry because, dare I admit it, we had been to Pizzahut for lunch haha

So 300 nautical miles... but we had a lovely day. 

(and we still haven't been on the cable car)

Next stop 247 nautical miles back to La Palma.

(Oh and by the way, we are not going to Wembley after all.... Crewe 0 - 2 Sky Blues but it wasn't enough.... we now need to concentrate on our play-off push!) 

Tenerife, LANZAROTE

February half term is usually the time we go to London to visit our Cub, but as he is now living in San Francisco for a while, we took advantage of a Fred. Olsen offer, cuising round the Canary Islands on an All-inclusive deal. Which to most people sounds like a lie down on a variety of beaches. This was NOT the case at all! (But more later...)

The only downside to the deal was we had to fly from Gatwick but it meant we got to stay in the newest, biggest PREMIER INN (at Gatwick Northern Terminal) which had only been open a few weeks.

It smelt amazing! The plush new carpets smelt divine and 630 rooms is a lot of divinely-smelling carpet. Which, incidentally, were all gorgeously purple.... and ....£17 a night? How does Husby FIND these bargains?????

We even managed an hour in the Daily Telegraph hospitality Lounge for a slap-up breakfast before we flew.

REFLECTION OF OUR PLANE IN THE SEA!

Window seat gave us spectacular views of Tenerife and Mt Teide.

REFLECTION OF OUR PLANE ON LAND

Respect to all Air Hostesses out there, how do they DO that job???

I couldn't wait to get off the blummin thing.

We were bussed up to Braemar who was docked at SANTA CRUZ and we managed an hour of sun on deck before dinner with our new friends, Tim and Mary, Gary and Tina who were such good company.

We had time, the following day, to walk up to the big wheel and one of Spain's largest Department Stores EL CORTE INGLES before setting sail for...

ARRECIFE, LANZAROTE.

sparkly twinkly water

I don't know what my doorah's Health and Safety boyf would make of curtains billowing out of open windows on the top floor of a high rise hotel....

...but we were busy finding a beach for lil aliholli to dip in...

...although lil aliholli wandered off round to the far side of the bay to play BOLT with the camera...

HOW SKY BLUE IS THIS BLUE SKY!!!! PUSB

AND THEN I TOOK THE PLUNGE! Literally-I  had to make a run for it as it was the COLDEST sea IMAGINABLE! As you can see no one else was brave enough.

And not an Atlantic roller in sight.

Little did we know half the passengers would be feeling sea sick within hours of this photo being taken.

Arrecife had adult toys...

Formal Night and the Captain's Cocktail Party whoop whoop!

but.....

Well the intention was there... I got changed and wore Linz's necklace, but one sip of the Captain's Welcome Party BucksFizz was enough to send me back to base to ride the waves alone. Husb survived the dinner with our mates but half the restaurant was empty, the sea was so rough that evening. It would definitely have put off a first time cruiser.

While we still had some colour....

We would have liked longer in Lanzarote, a few hours wasn't enough, but we were on our 300 nautical mile way to MADEIRA. Did we really need to go to Madeira???? We could have spent longer in Lanzarote and maybe visited Fuerteventura or Gran Canaria instead. (We DID stock up on wine though!  but that's in the next post....)

That, my friends, turned out to be the only beach/swim that week.

Cov v Crewe JPT Northern Final 1st Leg

We were all so excited! The anticipation was immense! Let's face it, we were in such good form and our manager Mark Robins had just been awarded Manager of the Month for completely turning around our football team. The Ricoh was going to be "A FORTRESS" with all seats SOLD OUT meaning the atmosphere was going to be be incredible! We were all BUZZING!

So I filled Orla up and set off, braving the sleety, snowy A41, and bringing with me my bag full of Peter Storm thermals, belvita breakfast biscuits, CCFC scarf, hat and gloves, IT WAS GOING TO BE SOOOOO FAB!! 

Well..... it started off OK.

 I met Kat's new baby, Joseph, and gave him his picture - can you tell how excited I was??? I even managed to colour a couple of  Sky Blues hats on it! PUSB!

We had a pot of tea each at the Holiday Inn and would you believe it, the Crewe players arrived while we were there.... maybe I should have known then that THIS WAS NOT A GOOD SIGN!

I should have popped the team bus tyres as I left... that would have thwarted them.

I had time for another cuppa with my sis.

I got to Burbages Lane about 2 and half hours before kick off so...

...I actually managed to park! It was all going so well.

The Sky Blue shop was rammed, I had never seen so many people around the Ricoh.

It was all so exciting, you could almost FEEL the buzz.

Within minutes I was hugging Dave Busst and then THIS gentleman who approached me announcing "I know your brother!"

(Mr Haynes, the Ledge, played football (goalie) with Diddy, back in the day.)

What could possibly go wrong?

The Ricoh Arena was FULL! What a great opportunity for the lads to put on a good show and win some of the CCFC doubters and armchair supporters back to the matches.

SkyblueSam kept JENNY's seat (JENNY's seat????!) warm for her... and we were off!

Actually, he might not have but he usually does.... =)

We had shot after shot after shot and we also hit the post, but it was one of those nights where the ball just would not go in.  Crewe's goalie seemed to find a knee or a hand or a foot to block the ball and at half time it was nil nil. 

We SOOO should have put away  a couple of those chances. When Crewe hit us on the break THREE TIMES and scored THREE goals (from their 4 on target) after we had peppered their goal with about 28 attempts, the crowd were devastated and started to drift home, leaving me in the middle of an empty row!

Even Hendo deserted me just before the final whistle.

It was such a shame that it all went horribly wrong in front of a capacity crowd. We were stunned.

I'm not going to write a match report. We lost three nil and that's all you need to know. We just have to score 3 or preferably 4 at Gresty Road in 2 weeks time. 

"Schimples, hic."

I thought Cyrus played well, McSheffers and Baker were vastly improved and Moussa wasn't A TENTH as bad as the chap sitting next to me seemed to think. 

We were absolutely MAGNIFICENT compared to the away game at Shrewsbury in September.

I actually had a brilliant night. Dick and Pam are the nicest people you could ever meet, I didn't need my handwarmers or even my gloves, I had 7 cups of tea, I had a Bussty hug, I met the last of Mrs Brown's Boys, I gave my little Orla a good run, I got discount on the M6 toll (it is £3.80 after 11pm) and I didn't waste any money in the shop on a silly foam hand at... a fiver? (A fiver for a bit of foam???)

What a "Jem" ! They are such a fun crowd. 

Mr Brown with Mrs Browns Boys (who are both little "Jem"s.)

Thank you for having me, see you all again soon.

See you at Wembley!!! Well, you never know. Keepthefaith. PUSB!