No. 10 - Its Gran Canaria Magazine

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GET TO KNOW GRAN CANARIA I CONOCE GRAN CANARIA Nº 10
Spring-like Canary Christmas
The Christmas season in Gran Canaria has a different
feel about it. The climate invites you to be in the
great outdoors all year round, especially in winter,
when the sun has a healing and cheerful warmth.
Another curious thing about Christmas here is that
the decorations on some streets stay on display for
quite a while afterwards, when in other parts of the
world they have long been taken down. Not here,
though, quite the opposite. Because after overcoming
the excesses of a sweet tooth and a succession
of sumptuous seasonal meals, Carnival arrives on
the island to fill the events calendar for February
and March, bringing more excess, another kind of
fun, despite the uncertainty of these times. Society’s
adaptation to the new reality has generated
great expectations for the return of masks, sheets,
singing groups, dance troupes and large throngs.
The party goes on, and after the Epiphany parade
has faded, scaffolding is put in place for another
great festive and multitudinous event.
To reach that goal and draped in fancy dress, a series
of Christmas celebrations have to be negotiated
beforehand, including visits and activities, with
family gatherings, friends and colleagues. Slotted
in between seasonal toasts and lively chat, a series
of winter shows are organised, with mainly children
in mind, together with concerts and performances
catering for all audiences and tastes. Many of these
events have a charitable side to them, with a variety
of good causes. The theatre billboard is full of
possibilities and dreams.
An essential visit, and a classic at Christmas time in
Gran Canaria, is the sand nativity scene at Las Canteras
beach, a monumental and spectacular journey
through a world of fantasy, a temporary and
brilliant ensemble, thanks to the participation of
some of the most renowned sand sculptors in the
world. This large scale beach scene attracts thousands
of visitors, and is one of Las Canteras true
attractions, along with its extraordinary views and
bathing conditions and which offers the smallest
details for observers, especially children, who play
around on the sand with great joy and let their imagination
run wild.
We move on from the hands of sand sculptors to
Gran Canaria’s great craft traditions, on an island
that delves into the past and prehistory and creates
art out of the knowledge of natural resources.
The Crafts Fair showcases many pieces made with
materials and utensils from the past, with some
astonishing shapes and with useful and practical
simplicity. However, the creative evolution adapted
to today’s decorative arts is also highly apparent.
A visit to the pavilions and exhibitors of this fair is
part of the 'must see' route around Gran Canaria at
Christmas time. The fair is a representative sample
of the island’s crafts and artisans, and is held in the
centre of the capital over several days, although
there is no town on the island that does not have
its own Christmas fair, and local shops are open
and decked out to encourage the public to browse
all over the island in search of that original gift.
On the subject of originality, the new year sees
the Canary Music Festival return to its original
spot on the calendar: this is the year’s first great
classical festival, in a territory where great orchestras
and virtuoso musicians fill the archipelago’s
auditoriums with sound, particularly in Gran Canaria,
with commemorations being held on 16th
December to mark the centenary of the death of
French composer and conductor, Camille Saint-
Saëns, who not only lived on the island for periods
of time while he created some of his works,
combining his stays in the capital with periods at a
retirement estate in Guía, in the Villa Melpómene,
but also collaborated assiduously with the Gran
Canaria Philharmonic Society, the first to be created
in Spain, in 1845.
Another highly original event around this time
is the TransGranCanaria, a race in which the fittest
athletes run straight across the island, from
one end to the other, from the coast to the summit
(1,950 m altitude), and then back down to the
coast. It is a spectacle for runners who face one
of the toughest races in the year’s sporting calendar,
featuring the ascent and descent of one of the
toughest mountain passes in Europe.
So as you can see, Gran Canaria offers a wide
range of activities to enjoy in all kinds of locations,
all over the island. And if you don't get to one in
time, don't worry, there will always be others, all
year round.