There was a great quote from a friend of Thorou (perhaps Emerson) about travelling. The gist of the quote was you are the same person when you travel. Travel doesn't broaden the mind.
Last new years eve I was drinking beer and watching TV on my own. I thought that next year, I will go away and things would be different. So in a period of deep stress, when I booked a holiday in Tenerife, I thought I would be partying hard on New years eve. However I booked my hotel in Puerto de la Cruz
in the North of Tenerife. Unfortunately all the hard core drinking resorts are in the south of the Island. As wikipedia says Puerto de la Cruz is the a city for the more mature traveler, where mature means ancient.
This is not really a bad thing. I hope (and my liver does too) that my wild years are behind me. Puerto de la Cruz has some interesting things and there are many places to read outside, so I am happy enough. Don't get me wrong there are enough bars around, but so far I have only seen one English pub since I have been here. At the table there was an old guy with 6 cans of John Smiths on the his table -- not bad for 14:00 in the afternoon. All the people in the bar looked like sun (the famous fascist newspaper) readers, so I didn't fancy a chat.
There was a stage in a square close to the hotel. However, around 21:00 I didn't really fancy staying out late watching a band I probably wouldn't like, so I got some cans of beer and went back to my cheap hotel room. I watched a Korean film called "the sword with no name" on Itunes. So essentially I spent exactly the same type of new years eve as last year - just in a different place.
When I woke up at 4:00 in the morning I could hear sounds from the party. When I went out for breakfast, I saw some people holding cans of beer,