Our visit to Arrecife, a seaside town on Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, was supposed to be just a pleasant stroll along a lagoon, perhaps a coffee in an outdoor café and a visit to the local church and market. And that it would have been without a lecture about César Manrique by Katie Chang on board the ship. But this visit turned out to be more, as you can read in the previous post.

Here is the post I expected to make. Still a nice post. We strolled around the Arrecife lagoon, stopping at an outdoor café for an espresso and some blue cheese croquets — delicious.

We admired some of the local public art.

We took a look at the castle that guards the harbor.

Outside the church there was the Saturday farmer’s market.

In churches I usually light a candle or two and say a few prayers. At this church the candles were not accessible to visitors, glowing behind plexiglass. There was slot that said two candles, 1€. I dropped in a one euro coin and two candles “lit.” By lit, I mean that a little LED switched on. A piece of clear plastic where the flame is supposed to be reflect the light. As I said my prayer I wondered if I dropped in a 50 eurocent piece it would light only one candle, so I dropped the coin in. Two more candles let. I said a couple of more prayers. I told one friend that I think I shorted the church 50 eurocents with my experiment. He said “No the church conned you into giving them an extra 50 eurocents.” No candles were consumed in making these prayers. Prayers are free.

When I went into the Tourist Information Booth at the cruise terminal I was greeted with the sign “Lanzarote Loves Tourism.” The guy behind the desk in the office ignored me. I cleared my throat. He looked up. I asked “Where can I get a Taxi.” The Cruise Director had told us there would be a taxi rank where the shuttle bus let us off. There was not.

He waved a hand in the air and grunted “In the town.” Lanzarote may love tourism but it appears that tourists are an unwanted distraction.