As a certified travel agent for four decades, an international airline employee, researcher, writer, teacher, and photographer, travel, whether for business or pleasure, has always been an important and integral part of my life. Some 400 voyages to all parts of the world, by road, rail, sea, and air, involved destinations both mundane and exotic. This article focuses on the Atlantic islands of the Bahamas, Bermuda, Greenland, Iceland, the Canary Islands, and Madeira.
The Bahamas:
Nassau, in New Providence, offered an immersion into British colonial life with its architecture, beaches, and landmarks including Fort Charlotte, Fort Fincastle, and Queens Staircase.
Paradise Island, connected by the Causeway, was a crescent of beach-fringed hotels, like the ocean-themed Atlantis Bahamas Resort, but a pocket of history, tucked away down a narrow street, was the French Closter, a 18th-century Augustinian monastery. XIV dismantled and imported. of Europe by William Randolph Hearst.
Freeport, on Grand Bahama, offered its colorful International Bazaar, made up of some 100 shops and restaurants, and Lucaya Beach.
Bermuda:
Bermuda, also a British crown colony, was covered in three areas.
Hamilton, the first, provided a base at the Hamilton Princess and Beach Club for exploration that included its colorful Front Street, Bermuda Botanical Gardens, and pink-sand beaches.
The Royal Naval Dockyard consisted of numerous venues including the Bermuda Tram, Clocktower Centre, Bermuda Clayworks, Bermuda Rum Cake Bakery, Dockyard Glassworks, Bermuda Arts Centre, Frog and Onion Pub, Craft Market and Bermuda Maritime. Museum.
And St. George, on the island’s East End, promoted absorption of the area’s history through King’s Square, St. Peter’s Church, the National Trust Museum, The Deliverance, a full-size replica of the 17th-century ship that it was carrying supplies to the Jamestown Colony in 1610 and Fort St. Catharine.
Greenland:
As the world’s largest island, situated in the North Atlantic Ocean, Greenland was sparsely populated, rocky, covered in tundra and immense glaciers, and in some cases covered in perpetual snow. There were few air gateways, apart from Iqaluit in Canada, Reykjavik in Iceland, and Copenhagen in Denmark. Domestic air service was provided by rotary-wing aircraft.
Aside from an aborted trip from Reykjavik to Narsarsuaq in the south, which required an immediate return to Iceland due to sub-minimum weather conditions, the nearly continent-sized island was visited on two other occasions.
The first, the Cape Dan settlement of Kulusuk, was accessed by turboprop flight, landing on a gravel runway, and was followed by a guided tour, conducted in German only, of native daily life, including houses colorful, rock outcroppings on which they were built, the community store and kayaking on the crystal blue lake that floats on the glacier in the center of the community.
The second, to Kangerlusuak on the west coast, was reached after a flight from the Canadian territory of Nunavut. The modern Kangerlusuak Hotel, inspired by Scandinavian décor, served as the base from which sightseeing tours to the Russell Glacier were conducted, via four-wheel drive vehicle, covering the local area. Due to the summer season, the thick curtains blocked out the light that was perpetual almost 24 hours a day.
Iceland:
Several trips were made to Iceland, whose terrain and topography were otherworldly, with black volcanic lava, hot springs, geysers and waterfalls.
The Loftleidir Hotel, located at Reykjavik Domestic Airport, served as the base for walking tours of the city center, including Hallgrimskirkya, its basalt-inspired church; four-wheel drive to the massive Gulfoss waterfall and towering geysers; and flights to Heimaey in the Westman Islands, many of whose structures were built on the lava excreted from the latest volcanic eruption.
The Eastern Atlantic Islands:
Trips to the Eastern Atlantic Islands comprised two large groups: the Canary Islands and the Madeira Archipelago.
Tenerife:
A trip from Santa Cruz to San Cristóbal de La Laguna on Tenerife, the largest of the Spanish Canary Islands off the West African coast, revealed the World Heritage City of San Cristóbal de La Laguna, the first example of a non-residential city. fortified whose grid served as a direct precursor to settlements in the Americas under Spanish rule during colonial times. It consisted of some 1,470 buildings, of which 627 classified as public and private are preserved from the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and mid-20th centuries with a mixture of Mudejar, neoclassical, modernist, rationalist and contemporary architecture. .
Other places of interest included the Municipal Market, the Town Hall, the Lonja, the Mansion of the Captain General, and the Sanctuary and Convent of San Francisco.
Garachico, reached after a short drive, offers the opportunity to go sightseeing at the Castillo de San Miguel. Icod de los Vinos, which is reached after another short section of road, includes El árbol del Drago, the Convent of San Marcos and La Casa del Drago for local wine tasting.
In addition to a tour of the Botanical Garden in Puerto de la Cruz, a virtual buffet lunch offered selections such as Catalan rosé wine, tuna salad-stuffed tomatoes, and Andalusian sausage and potato salad; baked chicken in wine sauce, baked potatoes, potato croquettes and cauliflower; seafood paella; assorted cream pies, puff pastries and ice creams; and coffee at the Hotel Tenerife Playa, overlooking the boxed-in black sand beach and its crashing waves:
Madeira:
The central setting for the second group of Eastern Atlantic Islands was Madeira, which offered a unique and quintessential Portuguese experience after a circuit from Funchal, on its southern side, through 600-meter-high mountains of pine trees shrouded in mist, clouds and occasional drizzle. , to Sao Vicente, to its north.
The highlight here was a two kilometer, 12 minute descent on a “cestinha” wooden sled. The sleds themselves, originally used to carry goods from higher mountain locations to lower towns, were recently converted to carry passengers with the addition of seats. Navigate by two “carreiros”, who steered and controlled the two-passenger wicker basket slide fitted with a padded seat and foot ledge, they were initially pulled forward by two ropes and then alternately overtaken on two stern steps, depending on the angle. as they sped down steep, paved streets amid daily automobile traffic, often crossing busy highways. Its speed was reduced by progressive horizontal orientations of the wooden sheets to induce friction.
Located in the misty elevated village of the same name and decorated with wooden walls, a beamed ceiling, a bar and a roaring fireplace, the Ribeiro Frio Restaurant offered an espresso after the descent, and something restorative, at one of the small tables circles made of tree branches in front of the fire.
Subsequently, following winding mountain roads with hairpin turns, past multi-tiered graded farm plots reminiscent of Malaysia’s Cameron Highlands, my coach emerged to views of pure blue sky and sea during his journey from Ribeiro Frio to Santana.
Quebra Mar Restaurant, with its modern circular dining room, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Atlantic Ocean and a volcanic mountain peak in Sao Vicente, served lunch consisting of “vinho de mesa tinto” or “red table wine “. from the Ganita wine cellars; cream of leaky vegetables, crispy battered white fish, chips and a mixed green salad with olive oil; thin slices of beef in a red wine sauce with rice; and fresh fruit topped with vanilla ice cream.
A trip through the ascending roads covered in cloudy mist to the Encumenada de Sao Vicente pass, which offers views of two seas, allowed a panoramic viewpoint at Cabo Girao, the second highest cliff in the world with a vertical drop of 580 meters to the sea, and lead to Camara de Lobos, the second city of Madeira.
Time on these two islands in the eastern Atlantic was brief, but complete.