The Number One Bus

Linea 1 bus at platform number 1 in Valle Gran Rey's bus station (''Estacion de Guaguas'' at the bridge in La Calera), connecting the capital San Sebastian de La Gomera with the south-west and the mountain villages of Chipude, La Hayas and El Cercado. The 65 kms long journey with over 40 bus stops (depending on demand), costs just 5 €uros  and takes less than two hours. There are several stops in the national park and the bus also goes to the island's hospital. Please note that there is only the relevant bus station's departure time given and that you have to signal the bus to stop anywhere else. You also must ring the bell (the red button marked STOP) aboard just before your destination, but stops are not generally announced. Also worth noting is that a bus or coach is not called ''autobus'' as it is in Spain, but only known as a ''guagua'' (pronounced ''gwa-gwa'') in the Canary Islands. The routes, timetables and fares for the public bus company Guaguagomera can be found HERE...

Light at the end of the tunnel ?

Government of the Canary Islands S&R helicopter in action

The following report was published by ISLANDCONNECTIONS.eu a few days ago and comes after some more positive news of unemployment figures slowly beginning to drop, demand for property picking up a little and visitor numbers showing an increase:

"The Canarian authorities have promised not to make any new cuts in the key areas of health, education and social services, despite the latest austerity measures announced by the national government for 2014 

Just days after Madrid announced details of the policy areas that will see budgets trimmed even further as of January, the Canarian government used yesterday's cabinet meeting to give public assurances that it will not follow suit, even though the amount of funding the region receives from Spain is likely to fall for the coming year. The promise was made by official spokesman Martín Marrero, who said that comments made by the Canaries' health minister 24 hours earlier about likely cuts had been "misinterpreted". "We intend to pull out all the stops to ensure health in particular does not suffer further, no matter what Madrid says we should do. We will show that there are other ways to tackle the crisis without simply making more cuts" explained Marrero."