The Day Sky Fell

Hey, everyone! Full disclosure, I have no idea how to start this blogpost without A. beating an already very dead but omnipresent horse or B. sounding tone deaf. So I will acknowledge the big, ugly elephant we have in the room and leave it at that. I could go into how it's personally impacted me, but I sort of hate writing up a story before I know how it ends, and we are a long way from knowing that. I had to leave La Gomera and return to Ohio to ride this out. I'll wax poetic about it at a later date. 

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For now, I'd like to share a story that came to pass just a couple of weeks before things went left, just after Carnaval wrapped up and things were settling down (or so I thought!). On March 4th, I was having a typical afternoon of lunch, tidying the house, and teaching private English lessons when I got a call from Oscar. While at work, he'd picked up some fallen palm fronds and was taking them out to the dumpster when he spotted a nestling Eurasian collared-dove on the sidewalk. He instinctively knew it was too young to be out of the nest, much less in the middle of a cat-infested street. He looked everywhere for a nest but couldn't find one, so he was going to bring it home where it would be safe. 

This wasn't the first time I'd gotten a call like this from Oscar. He works overlooking a well-vegetated courtyard, and has a huge heart and a keen eye for creatures in danger. And I have experience caring for birds, as well as access to the bird rehab oracle (my mom). Usually, the situations that crop up involve doves with cat injuries that we can't do much for (here's an obligatory plug to KEEP YOUR CATS INSIDE!). Another time, he found a nest of Canary Islands chiffchaffs in pin feathers that had fallen to the ground while the maintenance crew was pruning the courtyard. With my mom's guidance, he relocated the nest to a tall bush, and the parents went right back to feeding them. But a few days later, maintenance pruned again, and unknowingly threw the nest into trash bags that then went to the dumpster. Oscar arrived to work later that day, immediately noticed the nest wasn't there, and went sprinting out to rip open the bags and dig through them. He managed to rescue two of the three babies (one didn't make it, unfortunately), salvaged the nest, and once again relocated it. The parents swooped in within minutes, and all was well once again. A week or so later, the babies fledged successfully, and to this day chiffchaffs sit right next to Oscar while he works. 

spot the newly-fledged baby

My sweet guy

So, an hour or so after his call, Oscar brought home the baby dove. Upon seeing it, I knew it was about a week away from true fledging age, especially after watching a pair of the same babies grow up in a nest right outside our bedroom window in December. When they were its size, they started looking around a bit more, and eventually took a few steps out of the nest, but didn't actually go anywhere for quite a while. I stretched out this baby's wings and looked it over for any sign of injury and saw nothing. It was just scared, and probably pretty hungry. But I was going to do my best to help it. 

It was a bit scary to undertake my first rehab project without my mom's physical presence, but we were in constant contact on WhatsApp and she was firing instructions my way. At 6 pm on a Wednesday, the local pet store and the vet were already closed, meaning that I'd have to improvise for its food for the night. My mom recommended I use gofio, the flour-like substance made of toasted and milled mixed grains that's a staple in Canarias. I also mixed in some ground almonds and made a loose paste with a bit of water. Luckily, I'd been able to acquire a syringe at the pharmacy, so I loaded that up and got to work. Feeding the little thing was not as easy as it had been with the other species I'd worked with, because baby doves don't actually gape. Instead, when the parent comes to the nest, the babies reach into the mouth of the parent to eat the nutrient-rich food (called "dove milk") that it regurgitates. Fun! 

At least giving it water was easier.

After we'd gotten a full syringe of makeshift food into its stomach, things settled down a bit and we could really take in its presence. I felt decidedly feminine energy, but left the naming to her original finder. Oscar has a knack for naming that always makes me laugh. I like to test it out by asking him to name dogs we pass on the street, as he has a strict but made-up system for it that is not to be questioned. All golden retrievers are named Chester, all mid-sized black dogs are Firulais, all mid-sized brown dogs are Whiskey... and so on. 

He looked at out dovelet for a second and settled on the name Sky (pronounced "eh-sky" in Oscar English). It fit her quiet, reflective nature and pointed to our goals for her.  

Sky it was. 

Rental Car Adventures

In my second year living on La Gomera, I’ve had to get creative when it comes to escaping monotony and claustrophobia. As beautiful as it all is, I’ve explored just about every accessible inch of the valley I live in, and any boat or plane off the island costs me roughly 80 euros. There is a bus system that runs between several larger towns, but planning excursions around the sparse schedule is difficult, and if you accidentally miss your bus home as it goes whizzing by, you end up a lot like Spongebob in that episode where he can’t escape from the valley where people speak in fart noises. Plus, bus rides on La Gomera are NOT for the faint of stomach. I’ve noticed there’s a stretch about two-thirds of the ride to the airport where the most vulnerable passengers give up the ghost, and the bus driver calmly stops in the middle of the road and opens the door to make way. In short, not the most pleasant experience. 

Beautiful? Yes. Nausea-inducing? Also yes.

Instead of stressing myself out with buses, boats, or planes, this year I’ve opted to rent a car a few times to get out and explore the island on my own time for a couple of days. Unlike last year, it’s convenient because a rental agency in my town finally procured an automatic car. It happens to be a two-person Smart Car, but it works for me! Although I’m driving it around the same 14-mile diameter chunk of basalt, every valley is incredibly different thanks to varying microclimates. In general, the southern half of La Gomera is very arid and usually sunny and warm, while the northern half is moist, green, cooler, and cloudier. In the middle of the island lies the laurisilva, as well as several towering volcanic plugs. Even just a half-day trip to the next valley over completely refreshes me and makes me feel as though I’ve been somewhere entirely new. 

A few weeks ago, I decided I’d like to strike out in search of some blooming almond trees. It caught me by surprise, as my previous experience in Ohio and Maine hadn’t exactly taught me to expect flowers in February. But sure enough, just 20 minutes up the mountain, I passed my first tree. 

It seemed the almonds preferred the more arid half of the island, so I stuck to the south and aimed for La Dama, a town I had never been to before. I’d seen it a hundred times from below while passing by in boats, but never in person. It sits just one cliff over from my town, but takes about an hour to reach on the zig zag roads. This was a particularly good time for me to go, as Oscar was in Tenerife for the day and wasn’t there to tell me that there is literally nothing in La Dama and no reason to go. Sure, he was probably right, but I wanted to see for myself. 

Before beginning the descent to La Dama, I stopped in Chipude, which is the largest town in the center of the island. To give you an idea of just how bustling it is, when I parked the car and turned off the engine for a moment, the utter silence made my ears ring. I took a couple of almond blossom photos, bought some chocolate, and headed down to my unknown. 

A peek at Valle Gran Rey from an overlook in Chipude

It took me a good 20 minutes to reach the beginning of town, which was strikingly industrial for such an isolated location. I passed what looked like a defunct factory, some heavy machinery, and then several miles of enclosed banana plantations. It was such an odd feeling to drive between the translucent walls, sheltering the largest industry I’d seen on this tiny island. 

I was feeling a little strange about my choice of destination until the banana walls stopped and I came into the residential part of town. It felt much more familiar, albeit a bit post-apocalyptic with no people in the streets. At the bottom of town on the edge of the cliff, I came to a beautiful church plaza overlooking the sea.

I parked my little car and sat for a long time in the silvery calima-tinted light, listening to a mirlo (blackbird) sing in the tree behind me. I felt such peace in that moment, and such a sense of belonging even though I was alone in a town I’d never been to. I thought a lot about the saying here that if La Gomera wants you, it will do what it takes to keep you. There are so many stories of people showing up and being totally unable to find long-term lodging, or encountering some other obstacle in their attempt to settle. Everything for me has been the total opposite. Just two months into my stay, I was blessed with an angel who has made everything so easy for me. I never felt out of place or unwelcome. If anything, I’m wondering how the hell I’ll ever tear myself away. 

As the sun set, I got back in the car to head home, still in my reverie. I’d seen just one moving car in the hour and a half since I’d left Chipude, so I could stop at my leisure to take photos of the skyscape, landscape, and almond trees.

Each photo I took was more beautiful than the last, especially as I got closer to the cliffside leading up to La Fortaleza, La Gomera’s famous plateau.

Rounding a bend, I saw an almond tree nestled against the rock face that I’d meant to take a photo of on the way down. It was right next to a grassy pull-off, which made things easy. Instead of slamming on the brakes to pull in, I slowed down and started to back in. In front of me was level grass and behind me was level grass, but suddenly, my back wheel dropped off quite a bit more than I’d been expecting it to. I shifted into drive and tried to pull back out and correct, but my back tires just spun and I felt the car tilt to an angle I was NOT comfortable with. I put it into park and got out to have a look. Sure enough, I had somehow completely missed the fact that there was a ~7-foot deep culvert dug in between the two flat grassy sections, and my back tire was just a couple of inches away from dropping in completely and leaving my little (rental!) Smart Car nose up in a gulley. Panic set in pretty quickly from there, as I was scared to even touch the car for fear I’d push it in. But before I could even come up with a plan, I saw headlights coming towards me. Considering I hadn’t seen another driver in roughly an hour, I felt pretty lucky. I sheepishly flagged down the driver in his big, green all-terrain car. He slowed to a stop and gave me a look I’m quite familiar with: local sizing up stranger in need. I’ve received the look many times and have also given it back home in middle-of-nowhere Ohio. The crease between his brow smoothed a bit when I started speaking in Spanish, and he gave a low whistle when I pointed to the precarious position of my back tire. But he pulled over, got out, and started thinking. He was a large, bearded man who would make a convincing Gomeran Santa Claus, with several buttons of his shirt undone at the top and bottom. He stood behind the little car and pushed as I pressed the gas, to absolutely no avail. Several times. Oh NO. My wave of panic crested again as he started punch numbers on his flip phone to find someone to come tow the car. As he put the phone to his ear, another car rounded the bend, and he flagged that driver down. They clearly knew each other, judging by the way they started barking back and forth in the pure Canarian pueblo Spanish that still lies just outside my comprehension. New Guy took a look, kicked a big rock out from under the problem wheel, and positioned himself on the side of the car while Gomeran Santa took the back again. Three, two, one… And I was out!! I threw the car into park, pulled the E-brake for good measure, and jumped out to give them both a huge hug. They laughed and gave me a good dad-like warning to be CAREFUL, and sent me on my way. I drove off into the twilight, shaking my head at the whole encounter and how much I love this island. And how much the island seems to love me. 

The rest of my weekend with the car was rather uneventful in comparison, and just involved more beautiful scenery and a lot of me enjoying my own company. After a brief attempt to describe it, I realized that the main soundtrack—my inner monologue—is really not that interesting nor coherent, so instead I’ll leave you with some photos. My darling friend Katie from Galicia emboldened me by telling me she loves the photos on my blog (which are taken on an iPhone but are VERY carefully curated!!!), so I’ll let them speak for themselves. 

As the day came to a close, that Gomeran angel I was talking about (one of many, now that I think about it) finally got off work and joined me for the sunset at my favorite overlook. It was the kind of sunset that brought all my gratitude together and wrapped it up in a beautiful package. Lucky me. 

PS: Gomeran Angel número uno, if you ever step up your English reading comprehension and start reading my blog, sorry I didn't tell you about the car mishap! My pride got in the way ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Mi casa es su casa

In order to inaugurate my return to blogging about nice, happy adventures and not... um... existential crises, I thought I'd write up a summary of my family's visit to La Gomera last month. My mom might want to throttle me for beating her to the blog punch on this one, as she's been plugging away, writing about our time in Extremadura and building up to the island arrival. Don't get me wrong, Extremadura was fantastic, but the true gem of the trip for me was bringing my loved ones back to the place I've called home now for almost a year and a half. Sorry, Ma, but you told me to write today! Readers of both blogs, consider this a spoiler alert if you'd prefer to see my mom's take first.

As I just said, Extremadura was wonderful. We ate and explored and laughed and birded and had an excellent time--the only hitch was that we did all of that under almost exclusively cloudy, blustery skies. As I had never been to that part of the peninsula and have essentially no experience with winter on the Iberian peninsula, I didn't know quite what to expect, but I packed all my coats and gritted my teeth for the cold. In reality, it was never really colder than 50°F, but it chilled us to the bone. And my poor Ohioans arrived expecting at least a little relief from the grey flannel skies that blanket our river valley in winter... Think again! I kept reminding them that sunshine awaited us in just a few days, and that hey, doesn't that [castle/cathedral/rock outcrop/etc] look way cooler and more foreboding against a grey sky anyway?

As soon as we landed on La Gomera on the 23rd in the buttery evening sunshine, the sweaters were off. This shot still makes happiness bubble up in my throat like seltzer. 

We grabbed our rental car and set out on the hour-long drive home from the airport valley to my valley, just 8 miles as the crow flies but a whole lot more as the ribbon of road falls over the cliffs. I pulled over at every single overlook so we could get an eyeful of the sun setting over the mar de nubes (sea of clouds). And of course, we couldn't miss El Teide glowing pink and blue in the fading light. Isn't this a great photo of my dude? 

When we finally reached my apartment, we ran inside to meet the (in)famous Aráfo. He was (as always) a really enthusiastic and loving bull in a china shop, and they loved him right away. Sweet Oscar and his mom had set up a Christmas tree, and he made us all a giant tortilla española for dinner, accompanied by a salad made with lettuce we grew on our balcony. 

The next day, I woke up so excited for my family to see everything in the sunlight. It's a bit disorienting to arrive in Valle Gran Rey in the dark, as you have no idea that there are enormous cliffs towering over the town. If there's no moon, there's just a point in the sky where the stars stop, but you have to wait until morning to see what's blocking them. 

Our first stop was Oscar's plot of land, lovingly referred to as "our terrain", because the word is terreno in Spanish and terrain was way easier for him to learn in English. He's poured so much work into it, and took great pride in showing my green-thumbed mom his corn, potatoes, tomatoes, bell peppers, papayas, and more. Being Julie Zickefoose, she immediately took to weeding. 

After a few hours in the sun, we walked back down into town for a little tour of the neighborhood. The first person we ran into was Tete, the mysterious one-legged man who rides his scooter several miles down the valley every day to sell lottery tickets, advertising by yelling "LA SUERTE" as he cruises through the streets. No one really knows his real name, but he calls everyone Tete and everyone calls him Tete. I was sort of scared of him at first, as one of my first days on the island I came out of the grocery store to find him yelling something at me in a language I couldn't recognize. Months later, I told Oscar about this, and he told me that Tete tries to get tourists to buy lottery tickets by yelling in what he thinks is German. Apparently the Germans can't even understand it. Anyway, Tete had been donning a Santa suit for the past few days to spread Christmas cheer, with the catch that anyone who wanted a photo had to pay him. When he spotted us, however, he told us we could take a photo with him for free. You can see the pure shock and joy on my face at this encounter. It was only amplified when a tourist tried to piggyback on our free deal, and Tete told him it wasn't free for him and that he'd have to pony up two euros. He obliged.

The rest of the afternoon was filled with sunshine battery recharging and wading in tide pools. Once the sun went down, we slowly got ready for Christmas Eve dinner, cooked entirely by Oscar's mom Vicky. The only thing she did not make herself was the traditional Christmas pan de jamón, which is like a giant, lightly sweet calzone with ham, cheese, raisins, and olives. That puppy was made by the mom of Oscar's good friend in their family bakery down the street. 

Worlds colliding! Moms colliding! Even little brothers colliding!

The next day--Christmas Day--we got off to a slow and steady start, deciding to spend the morning making cookies. At my request, my mom brought a bottle of almond extract across the Atlantic, and we put it to good use with our friend Lucy's almond-frosted sugar cookie recipe. We hadn't made Christmas cookies since I was a tiny girl with my grandmother Ida, but starting a new tradition felt right. 

After the last batch of cookies was out of the oven, we decided to drive up the mountain to get the lay of the land. Somehow I managed to take no photos of that excursion, because there was an ugly, heavy calima haze in the air and the control freak in me was really mad about it. How dare the Saharan dust cloud these vistas for my family? My jaw was clenched all day until we descended back into town just in time to witness one of the most spectacular sunsets I've ever seen. Typically, calima dulls the colors down to steely blues and watery yellows, blotting out the sun's rays so it's just a ball sinking over the horizon. But we were in for a Christmas miracle. 

The colors were vibrant and spreading all over the sky and water, growing more intense every moment we sat in awe. 

The day didn't feel much like Christmas, but I was more than fine with that. I had everything I needed and more.

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A day or two passed before I felt ready to face the bitter disappointment of calima blotting out our beautiful mountain vistas again. But one morning, I woke up and peeked through the blind to see the view of the cliff across town wasn't as hazy as it had been. My heart leapt and I piled everyone in the car to go see my favorite overlook. 

As much as I love this place, I'd been avoiding it during our whole trip because I refused to let my family see it in such "bad" weather. If calima persisted the whole week, well, I'd hold out until the very last evening for a chance to see it in all its glory. But luckily we didn't have to wait that long. 

We took a little hike I'd done a few times, which starts at the overlook deck and follows the cliffside before eventually plunging down to the tiny town at the bottom of the valley. We wouldn't go that far, but we would find caves and rockface flora and a million beautiful views.

Eventually we tore ourselves away from the cliffside and overlook and drove into the laurisilva, which is the special Canarias laurel forest. All islands from Gran Canaria west have patches or swaths of it, but La Gomera's is perhaps the most celebrated. It's incredibly beautiful but extremely hard to photograph, because nothing accurately captures the way the light filters through the twisted branches, or how the total silence brings everything into sharper focus. 

I had a spot in mind for lunch, but it was on the other side of the island. No problem! We wound our way through the laurisilva and eventually popped out on another ridgetop, this time facing Tenerife. I had never been to this area in weather that was not foggy, windy, and drizzly, so I was just as blown away by the blue sky vistas as the newcomers. We also happened to whiz by a fig tree that STILL HAD FIGS, prompting me to slam on the brakes and pull a U-turn. I'd talked so much about fresh figs that it really hurt for my mom and Liam to miss fig season, but we got our redemption. I pulled the branch in with a stick and my mom held Liam's arm as he leaned out over a precipice to grab the one reachable fig. It was so worth it. I would post a picture of the victory, but our fig faces aren't exactly blog-ready. So here's a cool plant.

We visited and ate at the Mirador de Abrante, which is glass-walled restaurant sitting on the edge of a cliff overlooking Agulo, one of the island's most picturesque towns. We were lucky enough to catch a silbo (whistling language) demonstration being put on for a tourist group, which blew everyone away. After lunch, we stepped out onto the martian landscape for some photos.

you know we had to do it to em

the queen prancing!!

 After we'd gotten our fill of the reds and the blues (although who could ever really get their fill of that?), we rode the hairpin turns down the mountain to Agulo, which ended up being a favorite stop of the trip for those of us more botanically inclined. Because Agulo is on the northern side of the island, it gets way more precipitation than Valle Gran Rey, and the vegetation--both planted and naturally occurring--is lush. There also seems to be a generally more discerning eye for aesthetics.

 

Roughly 20 minutes were spent looking at this!!

The sun sank behind the cliff and we hit the road to go home. That night, thanks to Spain's drinking age, Liam and I got to go to a bar together for the first time! We ordered fruity drinks and Oscar got a Heineken, the smell of which reminds me so much of my dad. We played a couple of rounds of darts in his honor, and Liam managed to win both times, pouring water all over the heated rivalry Oscar and I have going.

Before we knew it, it was the last day of the trip. We decided to stick around town to let our road-weary travelers rest before their marathon journey home. There was lots of loving on Aráfo...



...A somehow entirely fruitless (but beautiful nonetheless) whale-watching excursion...

...And one last big family meal.

The next morning, we got up early to get them to the airport for their flight out on the little propeller plane that services the island twice per day. Of course I was sad to say goodbye, but something in me just felt so complete. I accidentally missed my bus while watching them walk through security, but in typical Gomeran fashion, my friend who works at the rental car agency drove me down the mountain to catch the catamaran back to Valle Gran Rey. 

This is my home. And now they've seen it.