Tenerife's trip

5th February - Day 1

Our day started at 9am at school, where we met the students from other countries. We were then divided into international groups and the treasure hunt began. 

 

The teams were divided by colour, I was in the red one. The hunt started at school with a clue hunt, from there we moved to the city to look for clues. The treasure was hidden on the beach, where we finally arrived. The red team found the last clue and thus won the treasure hunt. The prize was the right to use the beach toys the teachers had brought along. 

 

After collecting the prize, we had a picnic, followed by introductory games to get to know the other students better. Afterwards, we worked again in international groups. We were given the task of finding people on the beach and interviewing them about their trip to Tenerife. Once this task was completed, the Spanish students invited us to join them for lunch at a nearby fast-food restaurant, after which we went our own way for the rest of the day. 

 

 6th February - Day 2

At noon, we gathered in front of the hotel, from where we started our bus ride up into the mountains. Dario came to guide us and gave us a comprehensive overview of the area. 

 

The road from Los Cristianos to Teide passes through Vilaflor, the highest town in Spain, a full 1400 metres above sea level. However, Vilaflor is more like of a village than a town. In Vilaflor, we took a small tour. There we saw traditional handicrafts called rosettes. 

 

Vilaflor is home to one of the island's first churches, named after the first Canary Island saint, Hermano Pedro, who was born in Vilaflor - Iglesia de San Pedro Apostol. Vilaflor is also a place where old traditions are more honoured than anywhere else in Tenerife. This is where we witnessed the traditional washing of clothes. 

 

The name Vilaflor comes from an old tradition that a Castilian man came to the village of Chasna and saw a beautiful Guanche woman. She had later told her friends the following words: 'Vi la flor de Chasna' ('I saw a flower'). The small town of Chasna, which today is called Vilaflor. 

 

After Vilaflor, we continued along winding mountain roads up into the Teide National Park. Dario introduced us to the different volcanic rocks. We climbed to the top of the crater of one of the smaller volcanoes, from where we had a very beautiful and powerful view. We were at an altitude of about 2100 metres. From the top we had a closer look at Teide volcano, which is 3715 metres high. Teide is a dormant volcano that last erupted in 1909. The last eruption lasted three months. El Teide means the White Mountain in Tenerife. There are over 300 volcanoes on Tenerife.

 

 

After dinner we watched the sunset and had a picnic. Then, when it was already dark, our guide Dario gave us an in-depth briefing on astronomy. We were able to look at the Moon with binoculars and the stars with a telescope. Because there is no light pollution in the mountains, you can see the stars better than anywhere else. We also saw two satellites moving around in the sky. The evening was quite chilly in the mountains. It was a very enjoyable and meaningful day. 

 

 7th February - Day 3

The day started at 9am. We spent the day at the school IES Los Cristianos. When we got there, we were taken to the sports field where Tenerife students did a short performance and sang for us. After that, all the students were divided into international groups, and we were shown around the school. 

 

Around half past one, all the countries started to present their chosen themes. The presentation of the Estonian team was about European and Estonian religions. Once everyone had presented their work, we were given a quick break during which we had sandwiches and a variety of Tenerife snacks. 

 

When the break was over, we were again divided into international groups, and we all started working on a manifesto on zero discrimination. It took quite a long time to come up with all the ideas, but in the end all the students were happy with how it looked in the end. After writing and designing the manifesto, we had a lunch break which lasted for half an hour and all the students got to choose where they wanted to go for lunch. When we got back to school, everyone started to make one big poster with mandalas made by the students and the theme was "Equal Rights". 

 

The day ended with an exhibition where each school group had to show what solidarity activities their school is doing or has done. The whole school day was very long and quite tiring, but in the end, we were all glad to have done something like this. 

Heinrich's Story:

On 11-16th of November we visited Croatia with our ERASMUS+ project; YES: Yellow European Stars. Since I’d been there already, I thought that the wonderful scenery couldn’t surprise me any more. But upon seeing those grandiose mountains, I was shocked again. Because the summer season was already over, the weather wasn’t much warmer than in Estonia, it rained a lot more. This didn’t sadden us, since we had packed warm clothes in advance.

On the 13th of November we had planned to go to an island with a ferry, but it was canceled due to strong storm winds which had done their job well. Instead of that we had plan B. We can thank the Croatian teacher Romana for that, who made sure our journey was as smooth as possible. Our plan B was to visit a small, but cute village called Opatija. Since it was designed more for tourists during the summer period it was practically empty. After that we all drove by bus to Daruvar, which was the hometown of the Croatians that hosted us.

Overall, the whole project was very well organized, and I hope to be involved in such projects again in the future.

Alex's story:

On the second week of November I got a chance to go to Croatia, thanks to Erasmus+. I had an opportunity to visit Daruvar again and this time we went to see west side of Croatia as well. I liked the trip very much because I saw my old friends and got to visit new and interesting places.



I will talk about the second day of our trip, when we visited Pula city. The day started off fast because we slept in and we had to run to the bus. We had to hurry to the bus because we needed to make it to the ferry that takes us to Brijuni National Park. When we made it to the bus we were told that the trip is canceled because of bad weather. It was a bit sad but our teachers where quick to react and came up with plan B. Plan B took us to the city of Pula and we went to visit the Pula Arena. The Arena is an awesome building that was built in Roman time period.

After seeing such a sight we went to the next city to have lunch in a place called Roko. The food there was amazing. I ordered a classical salami pizza, but it was so big that I had hard time finishing it. When we were done we had a little walk in Opatija (the city we had lunch in) promenade. On our way down the promenade we went by the Kvatner Hotel, which is a hotel built next to the Adrian sea and is a symbol for tourism in Croatia.

After that we went to see a old church and castle of Trsat. I liked the trip to the castle because the sun was setting and the view was something that I will never forget. We took a lot of pictures and when we were done we started to move to Daruvar. It was a five hour drive. We made on stop at a Burger King that was right next to the highway. Around midnight we made it to Daruvar and after that we all went to our host families because the day was really tiring.

The second day was one of my favorites because I learned a lot about Croatia and saw some amazing sites but at the same time it was one of the worst because we spent around half the day in the bus. In the end I still liked it and I am thankful for this awesome trip.