Canary Islands Tour (November 1999)

It was August 15, 1997, and I was desperately worried about November 17, 1999. I often worry about the future, but not usually with so much accuracy.

The Perseid meteor shower had just passed and the Leonids were coming.  Normally, the Leonids are a minor shower, hardly worth staying up for, but every 33 years they put on an incredible fireworks show.  The last outburst was 1966.

The best place to view the meteors would be the Canary Islands, off the coast of Morocco. A friend, who’d just watched a total solar eclipse in the Caribbean, recommended we go by boat, so Dawn and I took a three-day cruise to see if we even liked cruising. Except for the smoking and a little motion sickness, we had a great time.

Several tours were going to the islands, but none on boats. In fact, I only found only one cruise ship that would be in the area, and their website didn’t even mention the meteor storm. Thankfully that also meant their prices were still reasonable.

One day I telling my neighbor, John, about the trip and jokingly asked, “Wanna come?” To my shock and horror he said, “Sure!” I considered faking my own death to get out of it (Dawn didn’t think I should fake it), but I'm the end we booked an extra ticket.

In seven days we saw five cities in three countries. The first indication we were out of the country was on the flight to Gran Canaria, where they served a breakfast of cheese and cold cuts.  The second was the “exit” signs in the airport, which read “Way Out.”

The catalog pictured a small, sleek ship with a black hull and a pointed prow, revealing its original purpose as a mail ship.  We were ushered onto a bulky, white, stub-nosed ship, announcing its new purpose as tourist transport.  Our cabin was “swinging-70s” (orange, green, and yellow, in that order).  There was a small, inoperable window that overlooked a lifeboat; air came from a single duct that could be opened or closed, but which only carried cold air. It might as well have been labeled “Stuffy” and “Freezing.”

The buffet operated sixteen hours of the day but the food was always bland and boring – clearly they were catering to the British, who made up about 70% of the register. The entertainment was painful with the exception of the lounge act, a quartet of young Brits playing American standards.  I fell in love the first night when they took my request for “It's Only A Paper Moon,” and I listened to them every night. Dawn developed motion sickness and was usually in bed pretty early, so it was nice having John's company. Fortunately, he never asked me to dance.

There were only 700 passengers on a ship that could hold 1,400, so while it was hardly a ghost ship, there was plenty of elbow room and we could generally get away from the smokers. It also meant we kept running into the same people, which was a problem because I didn’t like most of them. The worst was “the Troll,” who complained about to everyone. She sat next to us on the airport shuttle and, presumably because we didn't tell her to shut up, she considered us friends and always sat near us.

Dinner was pre-arranged so we always ate with the same people—three American women from Philadelphia, plus a really nice couple from New Jersey.  Since Dawn was also from Pennsylvania, we tried to engage the women in conversation but they embodied the worst of American tourists—no interest in the local culture, no desire for understanding, no respect. They'd never heard of the Leonid meteor shower and weren't interested; they were only there for sun and some cheap souvenirs.

All of the Canary Islands are of volcanic origin, and on Lanzarote a magma chamber only 1½ miles beneath the surface kept the ground temperature a toasty 200 degrees Fahrenheit.  While comfortable to walk on, it was too hot to touch.  The amazing thing was, there were no barriers; the place hadn’t been “Disneyfied.”  Strictly for the tourists, they would throw a bush into a hole in the ground and watch it catch fire; then they’d pour water down a shaft which responded with an intense geyser of super-heated steam. The most original idea was the restaurant, which barbecued meat over an open pit in the ground. I, of course, leaned over the pit to get a better look and promptly seared off my eyebrows.

Morocco was amazing. My guidebook listed a number of scams to watch out for, and we saw them all.  The first man we met introduced himself as an “official” guide.  With a little haggling, the price of a taxi into town dropped from $40 to $5.  (Then I found out the city was only five minutes away, so even $5 was outrageous!) We asked the taxi to take us to a bank so we could withdraw cash -- he drove past three banks before dropping us off at “his” bank, where he personally introduced us to the banker. Then we were passed off to a merchant who had an uncle who could get us a great deal on a Moroccan rug.

My guidebook also said to avoid asking about two subjects: religion and the royal family.  My first question was about the king, and my second was about Islam.  This was not intentional—the banker, like everyone else, had a picture of King Hassan II on the wall, and I asked if that was the person on the currency.  I found out that Hassan II had died four months ago, and that soon all the money would be changed to have the picture of the new king, Mohammed VI.  Then I remembered the guidebook said Islam forbids the portrayal of any living thing, so I asked why they used a drawing of the king.  The banker was very patient but clearly agitated, and I never got an answer.

Beyond that, the people were all very pleasant, not at all the militant guerillas set on the destruction of everything American, as seen on TV.  We even saw a McDonald’s, although the menu was in French. (History lesson for the day: Morocco became a French protectorate in the 1920s, much to the dismay of the Moroccan people.  They finally regained their independence in 1961, but French is still the second-most common language, and the language of business in Morocco.)  There were no fantastic sights—each new ruler completely destroyed everything that existed before him—and the city was dirty and overcrowded, but the people were lively and spirited.

This was quite a contrast to the tourists I was with. Everyone was either hungry or cold or tired; nobody was happy, excited, or interested.  Dawn and I had always traveled alone, never in a large pack of gaudily dressed tourists intent on making a spectacle out of another culture, and so I was completely surprised by how violent my reaction was.

When the tour bus pulled up to the Koubadi Mosque.  I was actually embarrassed standing outside snapping pictures. (Non-Muslims were not allowed inside.)  At our next stop, a “traditional” Moroccan meal that no Moroccan would be caught dead at, I felt humiliated. On the way back, we stopped at the Hassan II mosque, which is supposed to be the largest religious building in the world. The inside is supposed to be even more spectacular, with artisans from around the country working on it for over six years.  It was one of the few mosques non-Muslims are allowed to enter, but it was closed for the night.  I was really disappointed, and it took all my strength to keep from beating the crap out of the guy on the bus that said, “You’ve seen one mosque you’ve seen ‘em all.”

Maybe I’m just being romantic, but the locals seemed to smile and laugh much more than the tourists.  Maybe they were just smiling and laughing at the tourists.

I also had another revelation. In Morocco, stop signs and lane markers are only suggestions; every person drives according to his whim. But in Morocco, I did not see any “road rage.”  If a car was in the way, you went around; if you couldn’t go around, you waited until the car moved.  There were no rules, so nobody demanded that you follow them, and there seemed to be this quiet acceptance of everyone else.  About ten years ago I had been to Italy, and I absolutely detested it for exactly the same reason—they didn’t follow the rules.  I think maybe I’m ready to visit Italy again.

Madeira could not have been more of a contrast than the volcanic desert of Lanzarote or the impoverished Morocco.  Portuguese by nature (compelling yet another currency conversion), the capital city of Funchal is built on a steep mountain and covered in evergreens and grape vines.  The steep roads led to an innovative tourist attraction: “basket rides.”  Two people sit on a rattan love seat with sleds and are pulled down the hillside and through the city.   Obviously, no liability insurance here, either.)  We purchased six bottles of Madeira wine in total disregard for customs limitations.  (The only other things we'd bought, besides food, were two t-shirts, a pin, two candy bars, a Pez dispenser with a camel wearing a fez, for a grand total of $72.)

Santa Cruz, back in the Canary Islands, was probably the island I was looking forward to the most—its volcanic crater was the tallest mountain in Spain, and the tram ride to the top was supposed to be spectacular.  We rented a car and our tablemate, Mario (half of the nice couple from New Jersey) joined us. Unfortunately he wanted to see the “Black Madonna” (legend had it the Virgin Mary appeared over the ocean as a black woman; historians think it was the prow of a sunken ship that had washed up on shore) and the “pyramids” (two years ago, a developer discovered pyramids very similar to the Mayan ruins, and nobody knows what they are doing here). I didn't actually want to see these - I wanted to drive to the crater - but I was being nice so we saw those first, then dropped Mario and John back at Tenerife, the capital. There was three hours of daylight left and it would take 90 minutes to get to the crater, so it was perfect, as long as everything else went smoothly

We immediately got lost in the city—the road that looked like it led out of the city only led to the docks, so we turned around and got on the main road, which only took us to the other side of the city.  It turned out the first road was correct, we just hadn’t gone far enough.

That had wasted 45 minutes and we were running low on fuel, but I decided to head over the first mountain range and get gas in the next town. The mountain was quite steep on the city side, but the other side was almost a sheer drop into the sea, with a small village nestled between the slope and the surf. Navigating some extraordinarily tight switchbacks, we finally arrived at the village only to be told the nearest gas station was back in Tenerife!

There was no choice but to abandon the crater and return to the city. All the way up the mountain I kept imagining having to walk over the mountain to get gas, then over it again to get back to the car! Somehow we made it and we ended up touring the city instead. While clean and bustling, it lacked the excitement of Morocco and the culture of Madeira, and could have passed for any cosmopolitan city.  It was certainly an anti-climax to the end of our cruise.

The problem I have with books is I fancy myself a closet-author, a pretense I can only maintain while reading trash. To pick up a Tom Robbins novel is to admit defeat. I took John Steinbeck’s, “Travels With Charley,” which not only forced me to accept failure as a writer, but as a traveler as well.  Steinbeck asked the big questions—why are we here, what are we doing, where are we going—and while he may not have found the answers, he both extended his understanding and exposed his ignorance.  I asked the small questions—why are they here, what are they doing now, why won't they go away—and all I came home with were six bottles of wine and a cheap pin.

Oh, I almost forgot the meteor shower. The ship turned off all the lights in the front of the boat at night, which made it perfect for stargazing.  (They also put up little signs that said the deck was closed but we ignored those.)  The entire trip had been cloudy, especially in the evenings, plus the wind picked up and it became quite chilly.  We spent two full nights huddled in coats and blankets, mostly watching clouds. When I got home, I checked the web sites and found that the shower had peaked at about 25 meteors per minute, a far cry from the 2,500 meteors per minute in 1966.

One web site, which predicted this year would be lackluster, also predicted that next year would be good and 2001 would be the best. If they’re correct next year then I’ll try again in 2001. Dawn should be an easy sell; the best viewing will be from Australia.