This was the first package holiday Jonathon had ever been on so quite an adventure for him at the ripe old age of 53. Don't expect he'll have noticed too much difference though as I usually organise everything anyway. Using Thomsons in Orpington High Street certainly made it easier for me this time around so thank you to Suzanne and the team there.

It was getting dark when we arrived but the view from our balcony over the pools was still lovely. The view over to the sea on Monday morning was even better.

Our home for the week was lovely. We were staying at the Princesa Yaiza Suite Hotel Resort - very nice!

Plenty of space so we could stretch out and relax. There was even a table so we could enjoy room service if we wanted to be quiet. Add to that, more storage space than we could fill and it was perfect.

The photo in the middle below was the view from the end of our "street" using some strange setting on Jonathon's camera.

The corridors were like pretty streets with plenty of greenery around.

This is our hotel from Marina Rubicon - we walked there on our first day. A gentle stroll to find plenty of restaurants, cafes etc and a really pretty harbour with lots of nice boats.

Plenty of stone art to admire on the way - some better than others, some quite amazing. There seemed to be a whole "town" of it as we walked along.

This harbour was the quietest we'd ever come across - not even the ting, ting of the halyards striking the masts. Even the seagulls seemed to be quiet as if they'd been given strict instructions.

This is Gladan, a Swedish naval training vessel, often takes part in the tall ships races. We enjoyed watching her manoeuvre to the refuelling station and then leaving harbour.

Jonathon was quite taken with this chunky chain but completely smitten with the boat on the right. When he wins the lottery .....

Plenty of spiky trees and cacti along the way. The island is quite barren but the mountains make a lovely backdrop to the white houses (as does the blue sky, of course).

This beautiful hedge formed one boundary of our hotel grounds - I loved all the different colours that made it up.

Tuesday - another lovely, sunny day. This time we turned right as we left the hotel to visit Playa Blanca town centre. Even closer to the hotel than Marina Rubicon and a nice gentle stroll.

The harbour was very different to the one we saw the day before - much more of a working harbour complete with ferry terminal. Interesting all the same.

Lunch today was at Casa Pedro - very tasty grilled sole (for me). Jonathon said the creme caramel was delicious!

The High Street (the quieter end!)

Looking across to Marina Rubicon

"The aim of this sculpture us to pay tribute to the generations of citizens who, with their effort and hard work, have helped us achieve the level or well-being we now benefit from. This sculpture is dedicated to the generations of Canarians (our ancestors), most of them illiterate who, through their dedication and motivation, encouraged their children to improve their education and resources, which has consequently promoted the development of towns and boosted our current level of well-being. This is why the face in this image is anonymous, resembling a figure somewhere in between hyperrealism and expressionism."

So reads the description of this statue which stands looking out to sea.

While we were wandering around we found quite a few places to eat and drink, lots of comfy chairs, another pool, a games room (we even had a play at the table tennis) and plenty more greenery.

We also called in to the Public Relations office where a very helpful Carla put together a couple of private day trips for us - of which more later.

By the time we'd finished our walkabout, the sun was starting to set so we strolled down to the beach, had our first paddle for this holiday and enjoyed watching the sun go down.

Wednesday arrived and, as you can see, it was yet another lovely, sunny day! You probably can't tell but the person furthest right in the pool is Jonathon. Apparently the water was warm but the wind was a bit cool.

Our first excursion was set for Wednesday so Jimmy collected us in his lovely Mercedes and off we went. First stop Costa Azul in El Golfo for lunch. I tried a local fish - Cherne - that I'd never heard of before but really enjoyed.

The view on the right was what I enjoyed during lunch - I can think of worse places to be on a Wednesday lunchtime.

El Golfo is a rare example of hydro-volcanism - volcanic activity that occurs near the coast. It's a natural amphitheatre that opens to the sea and was formed by the volcano eruptions in 1730.

The Green Lagoon was just round the corner from lunch so we went to have a look. It's famous for the red, green and black colours that sit together. It is a result of flooding from the sea that is connected underground. The green colour is caused by a concentration of algae (Ruppia Maritima). We thought it would be "fuller" than it was so that there would be more green but it was interesting to see nonetheless.

From there we travelled to Timanfaya National Park to see the beautiful landscape and the fire mountains. We've definitely never seen anything like it before - it was amazing.

The Montanas del Fuego (Fire Mountains) were created between 1730 and 1736 when more than 100 volcanoes covering more than 50 sq.km. rose up and devastated that part of the island. The last eruptions were in 1824. As there is very little rainfall in the area, there has been minimal erosion and the park still looks similar to how it would have done back then.

There was a very informative bus tour (the only way you can go around the park and included in the entry fee) following which we were invited to watch some set experiments.

The one of the left involved a man with a bucket of water - he poured the a bit of water down one of the tubes and created some steam then poured the rest of the bucket of water in and created this geyser effect with a loud whoosh - very impressive.

The experiment on the right was to show how hot the ground was by feeding some dry grass in - as you can see it soon caught fire in a spectacular fashion. The temperatures just a few meters below the surface reach between 400 and 600 C. Not somewhere you'd want to slip.

That little blue dot in the photo above is Jonathon which gives you an idea of scale.

We were starting to lose the light a little bit but just had time for one final place to visit and this was Las Salinas de Janubio. This is a protected area of scientific interest where salt is extracted from the sea water. Before the 1730/36 eruptions it was the best natural harbour on Lanzarote but the eruptions created a sandbar that closed this point forming a lake called La Caleta de Janubio.

It seems that the history can be traced back to 1895 but with the decline of fisheries and competition with ice and salt abroad, production has reduced from c.10,000 tones p.a. to around 2,000 tonnes p.a.

Thursday arrived - another bright and sunny day but with a bit more breeze - very nice. Today was a relaxing day - book reading, crossword solving and the only physical activity (on my part at least) was to walk up to the tower in Marina Rubicon. Jonathon did that as well but he also had a few chores to run before we went out.

El Castillo o Torro del Aguila was built in the 18th century and is also known as Castillo de las Coloradas. It was built to defend Lanzarote from pirate attack. It also marks the spot where Jean de Bethencourt set up his base when he began the conquest of the Canary Islands in 1402. It was closed but you could peer through the iron door and see a room inside.

There were quite a few wild flowers growing up there, all close to the ground to protect themselves from the wind but nice to see.

Jonathon gazing out to sea. The mountains in the background are Fuerteventura.

Marina Rubicon from above.

I clambered down to here but it was a dead end.

Late lunch on the way back to the hotel - this time at Afrodite Little Italy. We were a bit dubious because of the name but really glad we tried it - the food was delicious (fillet steak with balsamic reduction for me, pasta with creamy bacon sauce for Jonathon).

Back to base and more book reading was called for - so nice to have the time. It was really no hardship sitting on our balcony, gazing at the sea, enjoying the birdlife, taking the occasional photo ....

Later, we wandered into Playa Blanca for an ice cream for tea then called it a day.

Friday arrived - another bright, sunny day - seems to be a pattern here! This was the day of our second excursion - this time to the north of the island. First stop El Risco for lunch. It was always going to suit me more than Jonathon as it was mainly fish but his choices were interesting. Not sure how he managed to end up with pork chops (have to say, my tuna was far more appetising).

Enjoying the view - would be hard not to!

Haria is known as "The Village of a Thousand Palm Trees". You can see from the photo above, that the village should also be known as the witch village as the houses are arranged in such a way that they resemble a witch on a broomstick.

This is Jimmy - he was our driver for both adventures and very good (and patient) he was too.

A quick diversion next to look over to the beautiful island of Graciosa.

Jonathon taking photos of the deep - it looks like a long way down!

Didn't expect to see table and chairs in the cave but there was even a circle of chairs for us to sit on to listen to part of the talk.

The "sister" cave is famous for the small white crabs that scuttle about in it. As Jonathon has an aversion to any and all crabs we thought it best not to visit that one!

As you can see from the photos, the northern part of the island is much greener than the dryer south. We even saw some farm animals - one herd of goats - and there were more fields with crops in them (onions, potatoes and corn for example) but they were still few and far between.

Our final place to visit was Jardin de Cactus or the Cactus Garden. This was the last work of Cesar Manrique and includes more than 10,000 cacti from the Canary Islands. We didn't have time to visit either the Cesar Manrique Foundation or his house / museum but he sounds like he was an interesting chap.

He was born in Arrecife in 1919 and was a painter. sculptor, architect, ecologist, monument preserver, construction advisor, urban planner and landscape garden designer. He decided that he had to transform Lanzarote before tourists did too much damage.

To that end, he fought for all the buildings to be no higher than the tallest palm tree and for all the houses to be the same colour (white) other than the painted wood.

Some of the cacti were enormous.

This one reminded me of Kermit the Frog for some reason - the "legs" I think.

Although I wouldn't want a cactus garden (even if the UK were warm and dry enough), it was fun photographing the spiky plants.

Finally back to the hotel for a rest, have an ice cream and watch the sunset so Jonathon could test out one of the settings on his camera!

Saturday arrived and it was another lovely, sunny day. We decided to do not much today - a bit of sun bathing (in the shade), a bit of swimming in the pool, a paddle in the sea, a sit in the jacuzzi and, for me, half an hour of aquarobics with Andrea so I didn't feel like I'd done no exercise at all this week.

We managed to walk into Playa Blanca for a very late lunch at La Gondola. Probably the cheapest meal we'd had all week (you get what you pay for!). Jonathon had a children's pizza at the waiter's recommendation and couldn't even manage all of that - the portions were generous to a fault.

The photo above is Playa Blanca taken from where we sat and enjoyed our after lunch ice creams. On the left is a view over to Marina Rubicon taken from the same spot.

J had to get "arty" at some point during the holiday - that was today! The three above were taken under water at Playa Dorada beach, the other two were taken from our ice cream spot as mentioned above.

Sunday arrived and it was cloudy but still warm!

We enjoyed a lazy morning followed by check out then wandered into Marina Rubicon for lunch. After much um'ing and ah'ing, we decided to go back to El Mano as we'd enjoyed it so much earlier in the week. Our main courses (beef fillet in cream avocado sauce and chicken in white wine sauce) were lovely but were completely surpassed by the flambee'd strawberries. Yum!

Jonathon decided to get arty again - this time with the water bottle and the pretty green glass.

Having enjoyed watching the people do their stuff in the marina for a while, we strolled back to the hotel to collect our bags and wait for our taxi back to the airport.

We had a great holiday and would recommend both Lanzarote and the Princesa Yaiza.

We hope to be back one day.