A small rock in the Atlantic: 31/07/2011

Thursday 4 August 2011

Las Nieves Fiesta

Las Nieves will be holding its annual fiesta starting on Friday at about 1 am. It's quite a big fiesta as Our Lady of the Snows (the Virgin Mary) is the patron saint of the island. The church holds a statue of the her in painted terracotta, from the 15th century, standing on a marble throne covered with silver.

Las Nieves is a pretty hamlet, in the municipality of Santa Cruz, but about 2 km outside it as the crow flies. Normally it's quiet, but it'll be jam packed on Friday and all weekend, with mobile bars and stalls selling cheap toys. The secular party goes on all day, with lots of special masses and processions in between.

Labels: fiestas, Las Nieves, Santa Cruz de la Palma

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Sunday 31 July 2011

Growing Bananas on La Palma

When I first came to La Palma in 1990, around 40% of the population depended on the banana trade: growing bananas, packing them, or driving them. But even with the EU subsidy, it's hard to make a living from bananas. If you're unlucky with the weather, you can work hard all year and still make a loss. So the economy is diversifying, and a good thing too. But bananas are still very important.

Bananas need a lot of water. Since La Palma is the wettest of the Canary Islands, it has the most irrigation water available, and the most banana plantations, particularly around Los Llanos.

Banana trees aren't trees. That is, they don't have a rigid trunk with annual rings. The "trunk" consists of concentric leaves, like a leek. They don't live all that long either. The plant grow one flower stalk and several side shoots. The farmer cuts off all but one of the side shoots, so that the one that's left grows better.

Another surprise: what I'd always called a bunch - you know, somewhere from 3 to 15 bananas - is technically a "hand". A bunch is a stalk full of hands. The variety of bananas grown here is a "giant dwarf" (yes, really!) so a bunch is maybe three feet long. And as you can see, the bananas grow upside down, curling up and away from the stalk. Once the bunch has been harvested, the main shoot dies, and one of the side shoots becomes the main one.

Labels: agriculture, Plants