Carnaval Parade in Puerto de la Cruz

Getting to know the new Interns

For the next day I hadn't made any plans yet, but as I only had three days left on the island I was sure that there would be something going on. I started the day quite relaxed, as always, and stayed in bed watching TV as long as possible before I finally walked down to the restaurant in order to have breakfast. During breakfast I checked my Whatsapp messages and asked my Vietnamese friend if she had any plans for the day. Until she would get up and answer, I looked up the dates of Carnaval in Puerto de la Cruz and found out that the parade in the city would be that evening. I sent another message to my friend and asked her whether she wanted to go there or only have some food in a restaurant or something like that. I didn't want to spend my last evenings alone in the hotel, doing nothing. She answered when I had gone back to my room and asked me if I it would be a problem if she asked the two new interns to join us for some tapas in our favorite restaurant and to go to the parade afterwards. I liked that plan, as I had been curious about the new interns in the office during the whole week already, so it was a good chance for getting to know them. We agreed on meeting at the German supermarket at 6 pm, and after having finished all the plans I got ready and went down to the pool to enjoy that Sunday in the sun and relax a bit after that exhausting Saturday night.

In the evening I took a shower, put the same clothes on as the night before, took my mask and left the hotel in order to get to the meeting point down the hill. For the second time she had arrived some minutes before me - I would never get used to the way down from the hotel. We walked down to the city centre where we would meet the two other girls and have dinner at a tapas restaurant. When we arrived there was a lot going on at the main square Plaza de Charco - people everywhere, already some music and a small market where one could buy all kinds of costumes and Carnaval accessoires. We told the girls where we were waiting and when they arrived we went to the restaurant. One of the girls was from Germany, but currently living in Paris (I was a bit jealous about that) and the other girl came from Finland and was talking such a good English that I was also jealous of her a bit. Both of them were quite nice and I hoped that it might become a great evening. We had incredible food and my Vietnamese friend and I tried to explain the most important things about Tenerife, Puerto de la Cruz and the Spanish culture in order to prepare them for their start on that island. We had a lot of fun and I was happy that I didn't have to be at the hotel totally alone - time was running much faster like that.

Carnaval Parade Number Two

After we had eaten three tapas each and one large dessert for the whole table, we paid and left the restaurant, as the parade would start 15 minutes later. When we arrived at Plaza de Charco we could see that there were already incredibly many people waiting for the parade, and it might become hard to see anything. When the parade started we realized that we wouldn't see a lot and we decided to run through two of the smaller streets in order to find a more suitable spot to watch the event. We were successful and found a nice place at another part of the harbour. We knew that the parade would be smaller than the one of Santa Cruz but this time it was easier to take nice pictures and we all enjoyed that incredible "fiesta" together. There were the Carnaval Queens and the Children Carnaval Queens (who were so sweet! ) and a lot of dance groups that performed incredibly good. The parade was over after a bit more than one hour and as we had already seen one the day before that had lasted three hours, my Vietnamese friend and I were quite tired and wanted to go home. The two other girls were still new in the city and full of expectations and motivation to go out and explore everything, so they told us that they would go to a bar or something and enjoy the evening. We said goodbye and my friend and I left the large square in order to get to the steps that would guide us up the hill. As it was early and the weather was nice, we didn't want to take a taxi.

We passed by Playa Martiánez and sat down a while at the round wood benches next to the sea and enjoyed the sound of the waves and the atmosphere over there. I would miss all that, I was sure about that, but for the moment I was already counting the hours until I would finally return to Germany the following Wednesday. When it became cold, we left the beach and continued our way to the steps. When we passed by the commercial centre right before the way up the hill we decided to enter Burger King and have something to drink and an ice cream - we needed to gain some strength before walking up the 150 steps. We talked about a lot of things, as always, and after 20 or 30 minutes we left the fast food restaurant and finally started to walk upstairs. After the ice cream it was even more exhausting and we were out of breath when we arrived up there. When we passed by the German supermarket I said goodbye to my friend who lived near that place and took a taxi in order to return to the hotel. The next day we would not meet as she had to work and to do some sports in the evening, but I also needed one day of pause after that weekend full of events.

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