It was one of those days where we didn’t really have much of a plan. Not that we make firm arrangements when we’re on holiday. There was that day at the end of the first week when we woke up with the clear intention of driving down the middle of the island to Betancuria, but mostly, we just got up late and mooched about out the back reading in the sun, then heading out for lunch to one of our favourite spots in Lajares or El Cotillo before ending up on the beach at the latter until sunset. This was a holiday, not a photography trip. Any shots I did get would be almost always around sunset, and entirely incidental to the main business of lying around in the sun and congratulating ourselves on having escaped from the heavy March rainfall levels at home. The weather app told us about the seven measly degrees back in Cornwall as we basked in the early twenties here.
Eventually, we looked at the map. There was a mountain view over the landscape not too far away that I remembered coming to on our first visit here together fourteen years earlier. Maybe we’d find that, and maybe I’d drag out the telephoto lens. But after that where? The places that were really grabbing my attention were all just that bit too far away to the south - it’s a surprisingly large island - reminding us to plan a base at the other end of the island next time. But not too far away, on the wild west coast, a spindly road led to a collection of shacks and cottages in the form of Los Molinos. Maybe we’d try that.
And so, a while later, after a drive up through that lonely terraced mountain valley before descending back onto the plain, we batted along the almost empty road towards the shacks, with no real idea of what we were heading towards. You can never be sure with the images attached to online maps, because they’re added by the great general public, and some people are in the habit of attaching their snaps to the wrong location entirely. Here for example, it seemed we’d find a small car park and a cobbled beach, but some images suggested pristine white sand and a clifftop full of hundreds of parked vehicles. An inspection of the map suggested the former seemed rather more likely, and so it was that we arrived at the bottom of a series of tight hairpin bends to the sight of a black volcanic beach, a handful of white buildings, and most bizarrely of all a riverbed that actually contained water, several dozen geese and ducks, as well as a lone chicken. On an island where just about every river course on the map turns out to be nothing more than a bone dry groove in the landscape, flowing water that wasn’t the sea was a welcome surprise. How on earth did all of these birds get here? There was a pleasantly odd, surreal “Portmeirion” sort of feeling to the place, as if it were out of step with the rest of the island. But at the same time, we were reminded of some of the more remote fishing villages at home in the far west of Cornwall - at least as we remember them before they were bought up by wealthy outsiders and turned into holiday lets.
For a time, we wandered along the riverbank path, communing with nature, especially Ali who was clambered over by the local barbary squirrels in search of any contraband they could find. You’re not supposed to feed them of course, but nobody has told the squirrels themselves, and it’s impossible to sit here without coming under siege as you try and eat an orange. A pile of peelings I’d put on the rock beside me to be discarded later were immediately carried away by rat sized rascals on tiny feet with bushy tails as they scuttled off to not too distant perches for closer inspection. We’d collect those when they were done with them, we decided. We watched the geese flying towards us like arrows and skittering into a large fish filled pond just below the rocks where we sat. One of them loitered within arm’s reach, waiting to see whether I had any more food, but she’d missed the orange and that was it. Further along the path we sat beside a mini canyon, feeling the warmth of the sun, watching this curious oasis and its inhabitants. It was delightfully peaceful, yet occasionally we could hear the sea crashing onto those cobbles on the beach, just out of sight, reminding us how close we were to the ocean. As the clock ticked on, the sky looked promising. Maybe at last, we’d have a memorable sunset. By now we’d been here for two weeks and the evening skies hadn’t given much.
A while later, the delights of the water park behind us, we were beside the sea once more, balancing on those black cobbles, where I set up the tripod as close to the shore as I dared. As the sky began to glow, it became ever more obvious that the show was on. Each time I altered position, I’d take an insurance shot for the shadowy rocks, and then countless numbers for the waves, trying to catch the white water dragging back over those wet black cobbles, while the pink glow reflected onto the sea. One of those where I knew I’d be poring over far too many images later for the one - or ones - that told the tale.
It could have been an abject failure as experiences go, but once in a while, you pick somewhere at random on the map and find the pin went in successfully. Not only had we finally been rewarded with a biblical sunset, but we’d been to the interactive zoo at the oasis for free as well. We never did find those shreds of orange peel again either. The little scamps appeared to have developed a taste for them.
