La Palma Carnival Cruise

Back by popular demand: the Los Indianos Carnival Cruise to La Palma and the remote western Canaries.

The week will start and end at San Miguel marina near the southern tip of Tenerife. We'll make the passage to Santa Cruz de La Palma on the Sunday, in time for the day-long Los Indianos Carnival street party on Monday 24th. The rest of the week will be spent cruising the western Canaries, with El Hierro, La Gomera and La Palma itself all within easy reach. As ever, the itinerary will be based on the weather, mooring and anchoring possibilities, scenery, interesting destinations, entertainment, and crew preference.

A note on the Los Indianos carnival

Like most Latin Carnival celebrations, Los Indianos has a satirical element. In the heyday of transatlantic travel by boat, La Palma was an important stepping-off point for the Spanish Caribbean. Today it still maintains close cultural links with Cuba, Venezuela and Colombia, as evidenced in the street food and restaurants to be found on the island. Many Palmeros emigrated to these countries in the past and returned to their native island keen to show off new-found prosperity, dressed in colonial fashions - extravagant sombreros and white finery - smoking fat Cuban cigars and powdered with talc. The locals took to parodying their colonial cousins in the carnival in the 1920's and the tradition has continued since.