There are living things here after all! Omar and Nora´s Uncle took us for a walk down to the only bit of water about half a mile from the house if that. He´s a vet (with a sideline in butchery...) and had a lot to say about the plants and animals. Two ducks. The plant below is medicinal but I didn´t catch the name..? It´s flower is beneath.
Everything mountainous is a volcano, in which the lava is capped off and dormant. Unlike the mountains that are formed by movements of plates shifting about, a lot of these were outlets for lava and so have craters!
In the evenings I have been out for two little strolls. One was up the slope of the hill by the house. Falcons of some kind nest on this slop and you can hear the babies shrieking! I whistled back unsuccesfully, but the bird was really close hanging in the updraft, I thought it might swoop down on me. It´s nice and tranquil in the evenings and the breeze is a lot fresher. Coming in from the ocean it brings clouds that sometimes slide in between the mountains until you can´t see much further than the nearest hill. Yesterday I just walked down to the big agave plants that may or may not have been on someone else´s land. It´s hard to tell because of the lack of fences. These were enormous plants. Unlike the ones in the garden they were easily nearly my height, the flowers being much, much taller on a stem as thick as my leg. Tequila anyone? Oh and some advice: best not to go for a stroll barefoot in a country full of cacti and spikey things.
I found Euphorbia Caneriensis, it was right outside the front door. In Las Palmas there is an enormous one, will take a photo of the picture in the book.
I´m going to try writing less about plants soon.
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