Natural History Museum

I have spent the past few weeks sick and waiting for deliveries (happily they happened over the same weeks I guess) so haven't really done much. The last week has been super stressful and difficult so this weekend I decided to get out of the house. However despite doing nothing, it has been an expensive month. But soon my furniture will be delivered and I will have a complete liveable apartment. All very exciting. But expensive. However the Natural history museum is free.

Dinosaur!

Skull

Horns.

Fossil

Display of hundreds of humming birds.

Dodo!!!! (Bigger than I expected)

Giant sloth (seriously giant)

They had a insect and creepy crawly exhibit. I regretted it as soon as I got in there. I have lived with cockroaches close up - I do not need to see them again. I got out of there quickly as my skin was crawling.

Giant scorpion model

Dinosaur in the main hall

Inside of a tortoise.

Snake skeleton

Croc and her skeleton 

Sea fan

Sae basket (type of star fish)

 The main hall is the mammals, with giant models everywhere.

Rhino!

Wooly mammoth (surprisingly small skull/brain)

Narwhales can have 2 tusks!!!(1 in every 500). So cool

Hall, dominated by blue whale 

Hippos - scary!!!

 They have a great dinosaur museum but it was so crowded at this point, I just could not be bothered! I zipped around. (I'll have to go back another day and see it properly.)

T-rex

More dinos.

 I got a ticket for the "behind the scenes" tour. It was more expensive than I expected but very good. Though the woman didn't speak very good english so half my questions did not get answered - but I did get answers to other questions I didn't ask, even if it took some time to understand what those questions might have been.
I really recommend the tour. You get to see the specimen rooms. Unfortunately there was not a lot of time to take any photos but it was very interesting. And they have a 8.6m long giant squid. Very cool.

The squid.

Tentaces (and the claws)

Part of the specimen room 

After the tour, it was even busier (and people were still queueing to get in) so I hit the gift shop before calling it a day. I didn't mean to buy anything, but like I said it has been a rough week. So I thought maybe something nice to treat myself. But I went all kid. And got a stuff toy and a book of pictures of baby animals. 

Well I figure if the next weeks are going to be anything like this one - a god chance of that - these will help. And if a book of baby animal pictures can't, things are really tough. Happily so far they work! Can't help but smile! :)

Treats (big kid at heart!)

Santa Cruz

Today I had a slow day. I explored Santa Cruz a bit this morning and worked this afternoon (after a long nap!). I think I have made the right choice moving to La Laguna in 10 days time. Though Santa Cruz is very nice (and I think the weather may be better here), it's very similar to La Laguna and doesn't have a real sea front/harbor/beach which would be it's greatest selling point to me. So I have just saved myself the 1hr round trip every day.

I do love the buildings here. They are so colorful. (You can expect to see many more photos of lovely old buildings in the next few months I am sure!)

Colorful

:)

The first thing I did was go down the the water front. Unfortunately it is basically an industrial commercial port. Not the nicest place to be. I was hoping at least for a nice marina with restaurants but it seems the prettier parts are the small streets.

The water front

View along the "harbor"

Not very pretty. :(

I have been very surprised by the amount of graffiti everywhere. I don't ind it if it is artistic. But most seems to be gang style tags - not pretty and very unimaginative. However there are some which really are art and well done. 

I ended up stumbling on the museum of Tenerife. It was cheap and cool (both literally and figuratively) and had a cafe. So I walked around (after a coffee) and pretended to understand it. The lady at the front desk said there were English translations (at least I think she did) but I couldn't find them. So I probably didn't get the most out of the trip but it was fun all the same. They had some interesting exhibits (even without the language). I found out there are scorpions in Tenerife. Just when I think I have moved somewhere where things won't try to kill me!

Giant scorpion (in case you missed the point)

My hotel is uncomfortably near one of those dots.

They also had an amazing fossil collection. Yes. I geeked out. But seriously, some of these were the best I have ever seen. I think anyone in their right mind would geek out. (And I wasn't the only one there doing so. OK, so the others were kids, but still...)

Plants

Tiny dinosaur maybe

Lizard.

Mineral collection

There was a section on the ocean wildlife around the Canary Islands. I am not sure if they were all to scale (the dolphins seemed extremely big) but maybe. I loved the shark and fish heads. Which sounds weird. I think they were trying to show the teeth (it all got lost in translation) but I just liked the expressions. :)

Happy shark (or fish)

Shocked!

I finally went out to eat tonight. I am always slightly amazed and often disappointed by the attitudes of restaurants to people (or women - not sure which) dining alone. I have found this particularly in Spanish countries, but Europe in general. Tonight I thought it might be because of me not speaking great/much Spanish, but the couple next to be didn't even try! At least I gave it a go.
I get a lot less courtesy and attention than couples and often have to repeat multiple times that yes, it's just for one person. Yes a person can be single and still go out and enjoy herself. Sorry. It really irritates. But guess I am going to have to get used to it. Because I have to eat. Sigh!