So would you rather stuff yourself silly with a top-of-the-range, organic, bronze-feathered, free-range turkey which costs £95.25 for the largest 8.29kg size from Waitrose (and don’t bother asking me what the colour of its feathers have to do with anything) or put that huge wodge of cash towards jetting off to Tenerife for your Christmas break?

Doh.

According to Travel Weekly, Low Cost Travel Group claim holidaymakers can save £201 by booking an all-inclusive package in Spain, Tenerife, Turkey or Egypt rather than staying at home during the downturn.

Check out some last minute prices for a self catering Christmas holiday in Las Americas or Los Cristianos on eTenerife.

If you own a VW in Tenerife there was really only one place to be last Sunday and that was on a family picnic outing with the club that describes itself as VW Bus Fanatics gathered into a gang, mad about double cabine T2 pickups. We´re ready to catch a rusty iron and make it a a rider´s dream.

SO if VW pickups are your thing, drive on by the Doka Club of North West Tenerife

If like me you have lived in Tenerife for several years and don’t yet speak relatively good Spanish some of your Spanish friends and acquaintances will be starting to lose patience with you. It may be that they are beginning to forget what English they know in an effort to force you to pick up the lingo faster. Or perhaps in the company of your local friends you feel increasingly uncomfortable when at the end of a long and involved story they all point at you and scream with laughter?

Well, in the immortal words of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, DON’T PANIC for I have discovered a truly effective and absolutely lazy way to learn Spanish. Not only will you find phrases that you once thought impossibe to learn tripping lightly off your tongue, you’ll develop a pleasant jaunty lilt to your voice and find that much of what you can confidently say in Spanish tends to rhyme.

Yes, I have set myself up with my own Spanish station on Last.fm. Easy, peasy and the songs I have included tend to be clearly annunciated and cover a wide range of topics though granted I am not quite sure how I will manage to include some of them into actual conversation.

Actually joking aside, it has been quite helpful. You know when you first arrive in a foreign country and all the words string together like a great glob of porridge? Then after you have settled in a bit you can start to pick out some of the individual words but you have not a hope in hell of actually pronouncing any of them? Well, listening to the words set to music helps a great deal towards both.

When I find a song I like I look up the lyrics and save them to a file. Before long I am actually singing along and believe it or not I find that this has helped me follow along with conversations when I am in Spanish company. Using Google to translate the lyrics I am also adding to my vocabulary.

So if your Spanish speaking skills are a bit flat, set them to music and you might find a whole new beat.

I enjoyed a special 7C Marketing meeting today with several friends that I have come to know through their involvement in the internet in Tenerife. Jack and Andy took their work too much to heart by having a flat tyre on the drive down from Puerto de la Cruz. Only one small thumb graze and only slightly late, they obviously have several driving tricks up their sleeve from the research that went into their brilliant book Real Island Tenerife Drives which is about getting round Tenerife by car (and a real bloody Godsend when you are descended upon by hordes of rellies and don’t want to spend the August Bank Holiday ferrying them round the island).

Another writer, Joe Cawley of More Ketchup than Salsa fame was also in attendance. Joe, an award-winning travel writer is another one who takes his work to heart, “Top trips so far, include, dog-sledding in the Arctic Circle, wolf and bear tracking in Transylvania, paddling into the Nicaraguan jungle with a Sandinista, and trekking the Inca trail in Peru.”

Ooo er. I guess it’s pretty safe to say he gets about a bit then. But honestly the lengths some folk will go to to avoid posting in their own blog.

Internet Marketer Supremo, John Beckley of Sorted Sites was the instigator of our little gathering and after bullying me into starting a blog (this one) some months ago now he is banging on about Facebook. You just can’t keep up with some folks.

And lastly, another Tenerife writer and blogger Colin Kirby, who is well known to the island’s football fraternity and one of the driving forces behind Canary Green, a blog dedicated to preserving what little amount of environmental integrity we have left in the Canary Islands.

Conspicuous by her absence was one of the very first internet contacts I ever made in Tenerife, Pamela Heywood, whose Secret Tenerife is still one of the best English language blogs about the island and whose Secret Tenerife Flickr account is the stuff of legend. If you want to see some pics of the real non-touristy Tenerife, go there.

I spend so many hours in front of the computer every day that my daughter thinks ‘Let me finish this email,’ is a form of endearment. Bless. It was very enjoyable (not to mention healthy) to spend some time speaking to real flesh and blood people. (Even if their virtual selves are FAR more interesting).

What have they done to TFS lately? I don’t know how families arriving for the first time at Tenerife’s South airport cope as, unless they have already decided to get to their hotel by bus, the access to taxis is blocked by a temporary sheet wall. I know if I had just landed after a four hour flight with a fractious four year old and petulant princess in tow I would not be eager to herd them on to public transport.

Inside the airport changes at the arrival area force incomers to skip under or through the temporary cord barrier or walk miles to reach the opening at the end of it. It is very odd indeed and had absolutely no effect on the bottle-necking of people waiting to welcome those discharged through the arrivals gates.

Thankfully the new Direct Airport Transfer Service provides some much needed relief to stressed mothers as they herd their clutches of tired bairns through the arrivals area. The service includes a ‘greeter’ to wave you down and carry your bags (bless!). Prices for the service are of course higher than the local taxi rates but still seem reasonable and especially worth it at the end of a tiring journey.

Other benefits include free child seats and vehicles seating up to 16 for larger groups. Prices are as advertised on-line and there are no hidden surcharges. I like the fact that it can all be arranged and paid for before hand so all you need to do for that final leg of your journey from airport to hotel is crash in the back of the car and sleep to destination. No worries about digging around for the right change or wondering if the driver is taking the ’scenic route’ to increase the fare.

Yes, I admit I was sarky about the (very) delayed opening of Siam Park. I also admit that when my nephew decided that on this trip to Tenerife, Siam Park was the one day out he really had to go on, I was less than thrilled. Something about the thought of all that cold water just didn’t make my heart pound with glee. “What else is there to do there except freeze my tail off in cold water all day long?” I wanted to know.

My family assured me that the water was bound to be heated and that they’d read that there were plenty of other attractions in the park for those who were determined to be difficult. Despite the fact that they lied shamelessly on both counts I actually had a fabulous day.

On entering through the gate, first impressions are of lush greenery and graceful wooden Thai architecture. High up on the hill a great, green giant’s head leers down at innocent newcomers who will later discover two exciting water rides inside that massive dome.

Like all theme parks in Tenerife there is a photo opportunity just metres after entering. The photo costs €6 and can be collected from a photo board just before the park exit. For once our family resemblance to Fester, Mortitia and the rest of the Adamses was not too pronounced and we were happy to cough up the dosh for our group memento of the day.

The park is very cleverly designed with trails that double back and wind round bridges and hills. Sun patios with beds and chairs are tucked away in leafy corners alongside a lazily flowing ‘river’ which carries visitors along on big yellow inflatables. We also passed the Wave Cove which on later investigation proved to be a huge area with plenty of seating, sun beds and fine white sand. The wave machine was very impressive and if it were not for having the little kids with us we would have likely made camp at this spot.

Instead we kept on till we came to the Lost City. This large and complicated structure of ladders, water slides, spouts and pistols was obviously built to answer every kids’ dream. As soon we arrived all three were off to check it out.

Though Conor at 11 was big enough to enjoy all but the largest of the main water slides, and Hania tall enough to be allowed on two of them, this was it for 4 year old Sami. Not that he cared. Apart from a trip round the ‘Mai Thai River’ on the inflatables with Mum and then again with Uncle David, The Lost City kept him happily amused all day.

A large monkey head sits atop the Lost City. Every three minutes or so a bell chimes and the head tips gallons of freezing water over delighted kids of all ages below.

The adult rides were really breath-taking. My seven year old daughter was tall enough to get into the first of these, The Mekong Rapids which she thoroughly enjoyed. She could also have shot face first down a steep water course on a blue mat though she decided against that particular experience. Maybe next time.

For me the Volcano was the best. I was shot on spirals through the dark on a raft shared with my brother and nephew while laser lights flashed and the Volcano rumbled until finally being sucked down a central plughole and spat back out into daylight screaming with laughter. The other rides were equally exciting though I decided to leave the Tower of Power for braver souls and without spoiling the surprise I thought I’d screamed my last during The Dragon (aka the Mutant Dog).

There were a couple of tiny complaints which would be easy enough for Siam Park to remedy. Principally there was no mention at the bottom of the long climb to the start of the main rides that riders must remove all their jewelery. This necessitated a second climb back up just to retrieve necklaces and rings and walk back down. Similarly many park goers unnecessarily hauled yellow inflatables up flights of steps only to find that specialised rafts were already waiting for them at the top.

Siam Park is great value for money. The management are to be commended for not tacking on extra costs for hiring life jackets for the kids or inflatables, charged for sunbeds or other sundry items but after your entrance fee (€28 adult/€18 kid, €25 resident adult/€16 resident kid) you need only pay extra for any food or drink items you purchase in the park.

Time flies by at Siam Park and before we knew it we’d come to the end of a spectacular day. I asked each my family how many marks they’d give the day out of ten. No one gave a number smaller than 50. And on asking who would like to visit Siam Park again I was deafened by their unanimous shouts of ME!

There are at least a million (okay, about 150) UK-based online stores that will happily take your order and post to a UK address at UK postage rates. One example is the excellent Hawkin’s Bazaar. While you could conceivably buy gifts for your family and friends here in Tenerife as they do accept delivery to EU countries, the time and money savings come from choosing gifts for people in the UK.

With their huge selection of weird, wonderful, lewd and plain loopy gifts there is always something that you know would be perfect for your fussy sister-in-law or barmy best friend. Hawkin’s aim to have deliveries made in the UK within 3 days of the order and advise that the last ordering day for Christmas is 21st December. They will also deliver free in the UK for orders worth more than GBP75.

My brother ordered the Stick Insect farm for his boys a couple of years ago and they loved it. I fancy the Make Your Own Morph set myself (hint, hint) and there are many other ‘retro’ choices that will ring a bell with anyone old enough to remember Vision On.