Maria, we followed the tour locations that the Regent tour suggested and told the taxi driver where to take us.

Today was Lanzarote (pronounced LAN ZA ROT ie) in the Canary Islands (population about 165000). When you first see it from the port, it is ugly. From those who went to town, I am not sure what it had to offer, so will let Olivia, Ngaire or Suzanne post. For those who went on the South Lanzarote tour, it was great fun and I highly recommend Regent's tour. As usual, the weather was in the 70's with clear, blue skies. The weather on this trip has been super. Bring suntan lotion if you burn!!! No jacket necessary.

There were about 4 or so buses that did this tour alone. There is also a North Lanzarote tour, but haven't a clue about it. So, will begin my discussion of the day.

We didn't arrive in Lanzarote until 12:30 about 1/2 hour ahead of schedule. We were allowed off the ship at 1pm. Our tour took off at 1:30, but they loaded the buses starting at 1 and took off as they filled up. Tina and Prabha were on our bus with us. Wendy and Frank were on a different bus, but also did this tour.

As green as Funchal was, Lanzarote is BLACK. The island looks like the moon as it was destroyed by a 6 year long volcanic eruption 240 years ago. As it was a slow volcanic eruption, folks had time to flee and no one was killed. Nevertheless, this once agricultural island is quite desolate. People's yards are decorated like they are in Arizona, except the sand is black. Everything is black, except for the white houses. First we took our camel ride. We pulled up to a sandy area and there were about 40-60 camels sitting around waiting for us. We were guided to our camels, with the heavier person standing on the left, the lighter person on the right. There were nifty little chairs that were on either side of the camel's hump and you sat forward and were roped in like on a child's swing set. As we approached the camels, some greetest us with bleats and all had either a cage mask or a cloth mask over their mouths. The camels came in all sizes and colors, ranging from palamino, to camel (duh), to taupe to browns...some had curly hair, others straight. Some were rather cute and others were rather homely. Some were very tall and others short. We were led to our camel, Patricia, and the camel behind us, Stephanie, was enamored with Doug. Patricia seemed to have a denture problem. This may have been due to the fact she was the oldest of the lot, at fifteen. Poor Patty wasn't terribly attractive, with somewhat wirey auburn hair, was rather short and scrawny and sported a bad bite. But she was rather docile and quiet. Stephanie was a big blonde with a pretty face and long lashes. I was sure I caught her flirting with Doug. The most jolting experiences on the camels were getting up and getting down, which were like being on an "interesting" amusement park ride. Otherwise, all the horror stories you heard about spitting, spraying with urine,smelliness, etc. were not true for any one of the 50 or so passengers today. We all enjoyed a 25 minute trek over the volcanic ash dunes and had some good laughs and patted our camels good bye before reboarding the bus and heading off to the national park.

While our camel trek began our tour with some laughs, the majority of the tour related to the ecological system and history of the island. Our guide was excellent and truly wanted to share and excite us with his information.

Our first stop included some demonstrations relating to the heat of the escaping gases from molten rocks and a pit stop for beverages and the necessary. Then we ventured off through the park on buses for spectacular and breathtaking scenery and educational lecture on the formation of the island. The second oldest of the Canary Islands, and an independent country, Lanzarote was once an agricultural and seaport community, but since the early 70's has become almost totally touristic by trade...some wineries are the only vestiges left of agriculture. It has, in fact, closer links to South America than Spain.

From there, we traveled through the island to a winery for a tasting, then off to another scenic overview, before returning home at a bit after 5. Considering, all aboard was 5:30, we cut it a bit close. I would most certainly recommend this tour to the CROSSERS and it is not a tour you can do on your own as only buses are allowed in the park. This was not a trip with shopping stops..we did buy two bottles of sweet wine as gifts. I like sweet wine, but others thought the regular white wine was just so-so.

Tonight we enjoyed the talents of a magician / comedien who was wonderful and then went off to bed about 11, which is really 10, as the clocks move back one hour.

Tomorrow is Agadir. We arrive around 8am and all aboard is 3:30. We have a group of 10 (Olivia, Suzanne, Ngaire, Ken, Tina, Prabha, Yvonne, Guy, Doug and me) who are going on a private tour to Tourandant with the tour guide Freddie recommended. So, off to bed so we can be awake for the goats in the trees!!!

We'll try to get some photos loaded tomorrow pm. I know Ken (and Ngaire, Suzanne, Olivia) went into town and is downloading some photos tonight, probably including Funchal.