Are any tour companies organising trips to Santa Cruz Carnaval on 4th March 2014?

[EricN]

Does anyone know if any of the tour companies are running tours to the festival on the Tuesday 4 March from Los Cris. I would try and take the Titsa bus but I suspect they will be overloaded that day. By a bit of luck we are across that week and it would be a shame to miss the spectacle.
Thanks

[SeanC]

To be honest, I've never heard of tour companies running services to the Santa Cruz Carnival from the south.

However, TITSA do tend to operate extra services on the important carnival dates. I'd imagine they'll have some kind of press release on titsa.com by next Friday on this.

In my experience if you take a bus early evening from Los Cris you shouldn't have a problem getting on board (you have to remember that most locals only seem to consider use of public transport as a last resort so it'll be mainly tourists taking the 110/111 to Santa Cruz).

You'd have no problem with the return journey from Santa Cruz bus station. On carnival nights they have this kind of odd system where they call upon extra buses "as required" & in the past they've had private security staff hired to ensure everyone behaves themselves while boarding the buses. Hope this helps.

[elvisalpha]

Yes all the tour companies have the organized trips to Santa Cruz on the 4th and also available on the 28th of feb. I'll PM you some details so it's not considered advertising on the forum.

SeanC this service is available for years at the time of the carnaval.
If anyone else want to know please pm me for details.

Also available night transport and return in the morning at 6am from santa cruz for the party lovers with one of the companies!

[junglejim]

Going up to Santa Cruz for Carnaval on Titsa is generally ok , there's plenty going on during the early part of day before the parade .
However coming back tends to be a bit frantic to be honest with long queues to get on buses and the usual ignoring of who's first in line . The queues are also a pickpocket's dream with all the squeezing up of people .
I've been a few times and it"s a great day out but if you are easily upset by poor behavior at bus station , take a tour bus - most importantly go! You won't regret it!

[bonitatime]

Carnivsl Tuesday is no problem with Titsa
More complicated are The there big nights

[danno]

Hi Bonitatime, when are the 3 main carnival nights? & do you think its easy enough to find a hotel thats not fully booked? Thanks

[junglejim]

The programme for all the Carnaval is here - personally I would have thought Tuesday was one of the big days , from experience !
Then also the opening Friday Night on 28th Feb. - 19:00 h. Cabalgata Anunciadora del Carnaval 2014
but each to their own - plenty to choose from all day and night!

http://blogs.diariodeavisos.com/loscarnavales/programa/

[danno]

Thanks Jungle (-;

[bonitatime]

Hi Bonitatime, when are the 3 main carnival nights? & do you think its easy enough to find a hotel thats not fully booked? Thanks

The two saturdays And The Monday night

Try booking.com but they are usually pricy this the of year

[primrose]

Hi Bonitatime, when are the 3 main carnival nights? & do you think its easy enough to find a hotel thats not fully booked? Thanks

There is still accommodation available, this is one we have stayed at superb position just up from the front where the big pond? is facing a park.http://en.hotelprincipepaz.com/booking/rooms_availability.htm

[bonitatime]

Thats a great location for Carnival

[danno]

Thanks Primrose, but typically its really hard to find something for the 1st Saturday night which is what Im looking for.

[Lissalyon]

Going up to Santa Cruz for Carnaval on Titsa is generally ok , there's plenty going on during the early part of day before the parade .
However coming back tends to be a bit frantic to be honest with long queues to get on buses and the usual ignoring of who's first in line . The queues are also a pickpocket's dream with all the squeezing up of people .
I've been a few times and it"s a great day out but if you are easily upset by poor behavior at bus station , take a tour bus - most importantly go! You won't regret it!

Oh! I'd love to go and lack of wheelchair accessible transport here drives me nuts. Taxis are soooo expensive when you do such a long distance. It just seems to really drive it home that I am unable to use abus. Something I never encounter at home. My OH doesn't really like driving here. The last time and only time we hired a car was a bit hair raising to say the least!

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In fact the one and only route the titsa bus runs to that has the wheelchair accessible bendy bus is the 427 to las galletas. We thought we would give it a go last time we were here and waited an hour for 3 ordinary 427s to go past, so frustratingly we gave it up as a bad job.

[bonitatime]

The 110 has a wheel chair service but only up and down once a day
http://www.titsa.com/index.php?accion=articulosseccion&IdSeccion=193

[junglejim]

Looks like the Fairground attractions didn´t open in time for Carnaval due to "Paperwork" - the administration really are giving the Carnaval a bad name for organisation ! They have had months to get this in order !

http://blogs.diariodeavisos.com/loscarnavales/2014/03/01/la-feria-abrio-en-la-noche-de-la-cabalgata-y-es-duda-para-hoy/?utm_content=buffer4e2ab&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

[Lissalyon]

Well a wheelchair taxi has been booked for tues at a cost of 100 euros. I really hope we have a lovely day and it's worth the expense. We leave at 11 so will have a full day. It's what you make of it I suppose. Any must- sees anyone?

Thanks bonita will check the link.

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The 110 has a wheel chair service but only up and down once a day
http://www.titsa.com/index.php?accion=articulosseccion&IdSeccion=193
I remember being told about this bus but had forgotten all about it. Can you please tell me what time it leaves and where in las Americas or Los cris you can pick it up. For some reason google translate isn't doing a very good job at the moment.

[bonitatime]

It leaves Pdla bus station at 09.55
And Santa Cruz to come back at 15.25
But you have to book it in advance

[Lissalyon]

Wish idthought of that. We could at least have used it toget there. Shame it returns so early. It's probably why I'd dismissed it before for not giving us a very long time to have a good visit.
I wonder how much it costs. Might be worth considering for another time. Wish it returned at 5 pm! Though!

[bonitatime]

Same price as The bus about 9€ each way per person

[Lissalyon]

Well we haven't been back long from the carnival. Had an excellent day out.
Our driver Jonas is Swedish and I can well recommend him. His English was perfect and he drove beautifully. He can get upto three wheelchairs In it. Not sure how many hecan seat but I'll say 8 but it could be more. He's ideal if anyone who wants to book him for the day. He will go anywhere you want him too ..anyway enough of the ad needless to say all my fears about not having a reliable driver went out the window.

Jonas dropped us at the auditorium as cars weren't allowed any further and we headed for el corte ingles for lunch and it was shut.

There was no one giving out leaflets or information so we followed the crowd and came to a park where there was singing and a band on. Also found a nice bakery with disabled loo.

Then we headed down to the port along with everyone else of course.

Well the gods must have been smiling on us because the street we came down on led us right down to the disabled viewing area. Not that we saw it at all. We parked up beside it and a kindly spaniard gave us the nod, which is how we came to have a ringside seat plus a seat for OH and a disabled loo for me! Oh joy! No fear of pickpockets in there as we also had a police officer guarding us as well ! No one got in without her say so!! Ha! ha!

The parade lasted 3 hours and was excellent. It started to get quite chilly about 6pm so was glad I'd taken a fleece...but it got chillier than that! Never mind!

Anyway as it was coming to a close around 7 we told Jonas we would start making our way to the auditorium and asked him to meet us at 8.

it was a bit of a hectic push getting through the fairground but we got to our meeting place at 7-30 and Jonas arrived on the dot of 8.

We got back at 9....starving and headed straight into La Malvasia for an amazing meal.

3 courses for €8-95!

We expected something pretty bog standard for that but it was beautiful.

Massive plate of tuna salad. Then grilled chicken breast with chips, salad ...lots of raw onion that I love...and a little dome of rice. I had the curry sauce on the side. Again expecting it to be pretty bog standard ..but it was gorgeous.

I couldn't face dessert, till the waiter said he had tiramisu. So I thought I'll force myself and I'll just have to be bad tomorrow. OH had a whacking big piece of creme caramel followed by my chocolate ice cream. I don't know what had happened to my tiramisu but I wasn't going to argue the toss as I couldn't have finished it anyway.

Then having paid the bill we sneaked out...in case someone came after us and said ...sorry that's €28-95. Each!

We will be back!

Excellent day. Never to be repeated, but thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere, costumes and parade

[junglejim]

Thanks for your report Lissalyon and I´m delighted you had a great day out full of good memories !

[Lissalyon]

Thanks Jim, got some fantastic photos from our ringside seat as well.

Now just need some poor unsuspecting person to bore them with.

No doubt I'll find someone today!
(kidding)

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Thanks Jim, got some fantastic photos from our ringside seat as well.

Now just need some poor unsuspecting person to bore them with.

No doubt I'll find someone today!
(kidding)

[bonitatime]

I am really pleased you had a good day