You may swoon over views from road-trip lookouts, however nothing beats whacking on mountain climbing boots and hitting the trekking paths for a style of Tenerife means past the vacationer path. Solely while you strike out on foot are you able to even start to understand how totally wild this island actually is.
With a mellow year-round local weather and an insane quantity of biodiversity packed right into a small area, Tenerife deserves to be higher feted for its out-of-this-world mountain climbing. Clamber alongside cliffs on the savagely stunning coast, with the Atlantic booming under, slip by means of subtropical terraces stippled with banana bushes and palms, tread softly by means of primeval laurel forests, and rise on the break of day to climb a volcano above a lavascape that appears like Mars – then you definitely’ll really feel the island’s true marvel.
One of the best half? It’s all marvelously accessible, with trails simply reached by bus and automotive, and plenty of appropriate for teenagers. On the finish of a sweaty day, you possibly can swim in a bay to chill off, with a plate of recent seafood and chilly cerveza ready for you on shore.
Pico del Teide is the very best hike with out-of-this-world views
8.3km (5.2 miles) from Montaña Blanca–La Rambleta, 5-6 hours, difficult
This hike is the massive one: a tough, robust, however massively rewarding ascent to Spain’s highest peak and a volcano to high all of them: 3715m (12,188ft) Pico del Teide. Usually rising above a blanket of clouds, the crater has top-of-the-beanstalk views throughout the lunar valley under, pockmarked with cañadas (depressions), and much past to the islands of La Gomera, La Palma and El Hierro, which shimmer throughout the Atlantic.
Beginning on the foot of Montaña Blanca, the path eases you in gently on a path traversing lava and pumice, however don’t be fooled. Earlier than you understand it, you’ll be on Teide’s darkish slopes and hoofing it up a breathtakingly steep ridge to the 3270m (10,728ft) Refugio de Altavista, the place stargazers and people eager to glimpse the summit at dawn mattress down for the evening. Seize a drink and revel in a packed picnic earlier than persevering with over tongues of lava to the higher cable automotive station, the place the views crack open.
Offering you’ve acquired a allow, you possibly can proceed to the crater for much more staggering views. Or content material your self with the views from Mirador de La Fortaleza lookout level (3537m) on the higher cable automotive station. From right here you possibly can take within the rust-red ridges of La Fortaleza, which fling up like pure fortifications, the Huevos del Teide (“Teide Eggs”), huge boulders of magma – technically accretion balls – that rolled down the mountainside when the volcano erupted, and far of the island’s north. From right here, your poor, drained legs will welcome the cable automotive down. The bottom station is 3km from the trailhead.
Spring and fall are good occasions for this extremely memorable climb since you’ll dodge the winter snow and summer time warmth and get to see the panorama at its least crowded and most photogenic, with crisp mild, wildflowers and maybe a light-weight dusting of snow. Good climate is crucial if you would like views. Simply 200 permits are issued per day, so if you wish to sort out the height within the excessive season, you’ll have to plan months forward. Alternatively, for those who would favor some firm and don’t wish to do the paperwork, be part of a guided hike.
Roques de García Path is the simplest stroll, good for households
3.5km (2.2 miles) spherical journey, 2 hours, straightforward
Save climbing Teide for one more day – if you would like the full-on explosive drama of the nationwide park with out the uphill slog, Roques de García chucks you in on the geological deep finish. Nature threw out the rulebook right here, with bizarrely twisted, buckled and contorted lava pinnacles flinging up from the rust-red, desert-like panorama. Sure, it’s fashionable, with buses disgorging day-trippers on the trailhead parking zone at Mirador de la Ruleta, however most guests go no farther than the point of view. This round path is a quieter method to glimpse the solidified streams of magma and spectacularly eroded volcanic dykes.
Doable for households with small children, this path delivers most wow for minimal effort. Arrive early earlier than the parking zone will get full and produce sturdy sneakers and heat layers. If you wish to see the realm at its most peaceable, hike at sundown, when the shadows deepen and the panorama is bathed in golden mild, or on a brilliant moonlit evening.
The path is initially flat and delicate because it heads right down to the sedimentary Ucanca plains, however it picks up tempo and steepens towards the tip. Hold your digicam helpful for rock stars just like the twisting Roque Cinchado, nicknamed the “Stone Tree” or “Finger of God,” so iconic it featured on Spain’s previous 1000 peseta word. Different consideration grabbers embody the waterfall-like lava tongue of La Cascada and cathedral-shaped phonolitic chimney La Catedral. For those who see a flash of blue among the many rocks, it is likely to be a Gallot’s lizard, which is endemic to the Canaries.
Barranco de Masca is Tenerife’s best gorge hike
10km (6.2 miles) round-trip, 6 hours, reasonable to difficult
Clinging aerie-like to a mountaintop and rimmed by shaggy peaks and nice fists of rock, the tiny hamlet of Masca seems as if it might blow away with only a puff of breath. Following a highway that helter-skelters ever larger into the mountains, the drive right here is kind of one thing, however it pales by comparability to this hike, which drops you into Tenerife’s loveliest gorge, Barranco de Masca.
Heading over stream and orchard, with vertical partitions of rock rising up on both facet, the path by means of the ravine to the ocean is rugged, difficult and one for good climate solely. Rockfall and landslides generally is a actual danger, however it’s price it: your reward on the finish is the possibility to leap gleefully into the beautiful turquoise water of a cliff-wrapped bay.
The round-trip hike takes round six hours, or you possibly can stroll a technique and catch the ferry again to Los Gigantes. For those who don’t really feel assured strolling alone or would favor to go together with a bunch, enlist a information like El Cardón.
Rambla del Castro is the perfect coastal hike
8.6km (5.3 miles) spherical journey, 2¼ hours, straightforward
All is sea and sky on this cliff-hugging hike within the island’s north, weaving alongside the coast from Resort Maritim in Puerto de la Cruz to Mirador de San Pedro. The crashing Atlantic is your fixed companion as you choose your means alongside cobbled trails and filth tracks that lead by means of banana plantations, palm groves and stone-walled terraces, and over ravines and cliffs, to wave-smashed bays the place pirates as soon as hid their booty.
For such a brief stroll (simply over an hour a technique), highlights are many and diversified. Look out for the strikingly eroded rock formations, arches and caves of Playa de los Roques; the ruins of La Gordejuela, Tenerife’s first steam pump relationship to 1903, which was initially used to irrigate the bananas; and the wild, black-sand crescent of La Fajana. You’ll additionally get to see Fortín de San Fernando, somewhat 18th-century fort constructed to push back pirates; cliff-clasped, waterfall-splashed Playa de Castro (greatest at low tide); and the Sixteenth-century hermitage of San Pedro with its baroque statue of the saint.
Pico Viejo is a permit-free volcano climb
9.3km (5.8 miles) from Mirador de Pico Viejo–Mirador de las Narices del Teide, 5 hours, difficult
Pico Viejo (“Previous Peak”) performs second fiddle to its large brother, Pico del Teide, however clued-up hikers know that this far-less-crowded trek is simply as compelling – and also you don’t want a allow. Get an early begin so that you don’t should rush and you may expertise this Martian panorama within the hush of morning. This scene-stealer of a 3135m-high (10,285ft) volcano was the final on the island to correctly blow its high in 1798, spewing magma excessive into the air. Torrents of swirling lava solidified on its slopes, and to this present day, no vegetation grows right here.
From La Rambleta at Teide’s higher cable automotive station, it’s a simple however staggering 30-minute ramble previous sulfur-belching fumaroles and tongues of black lava to the trailhead at Pico Viejo viewpoint. Right here you start your stroll on a excessive, with gasp-out-loud views of the mighty crater, measuring a whopping 800m (2624ft) in diameter, and past to the islands of La Gomera, El Hierro and La Palma. Take photographs and a breather for summoning all of your vitality for Sendero (Path 9).
It’s one heck of a descent, a relentless, strenuous and at occasions steep downhill scramble throughout rust-brown cinder scree on a barely outlined path. Nevertheless it’s a magnificence – strolling on this arid peak in direction of the crater is like strolling on the moon. The following tough and rugged part crosses pumice stone earlier than skirting Pico del Viejo’s southern rim. The route then drops abruptly right down to the 2 buried craters of Las Narices del Teide (“Teide’s Nostrils”) earlier than reaching the TF-38 highway at path’s finish.
Mil Ventanas de Güimar is a troublesome hike with cliff-hanger moments
13km (8.1 miles) round-trip, 4 hours, difficult
With a reputation like “Thousand Home windows,” you’d anticipate this trek to be a knockout, and also you’d be proper, however it’s additionally a troublesome nut. You’ll gasp on the vertical partitions of rock punching excessive above the void as you dangle on the sting of a breathtakingly sheer ridge, pulse racing. Tenerife’s east coast unfurls giddily under you as you burrow by means of the ventanas (home windows), tunnels hacked out into the cliff face that had been initially constructed as a method of transporting water from the mountains however by no means realized their function.
This hike isn’t for the unexperienced, faint-hearted or uncertain of foot. The trailhead is close to the parking zone at Antena de Comunicaciones, off the TF-28, which is reached through a steep, slim highway.
An indication firstly makes it blatantly apparent that you simply try this stroll at your personal danger. The path is uncovered, and rockfall generally is a hazard. Try it solely in secure climate and produce loads of water and a flashlight. Logistically, it’s simpler (if longer) to achieve the eighth window after which backtrack to the beginning, relatively than persevering with on the rugged path to Güimar.
Anaga’s Chamorga to Playa de Roque Bermejo is a hike by means of wild coastal magnificence
8.7km (5.4 miles) round-trip, 4 hours, reasonable
The Anaga Rural Park in Tenerife’s northeast is a wild, forgotten world, with Eden-like valleys, sculpted terraces echoing the contours of the mountains, jagged cliffs diving into the piercing blue Atlantic and mossy laurisilva (laurel) forests that look ripe for a Tolkien fantasy. That is the Tenerife you’ll want somebody had informed you about sooner.
Make it this far, and also you’ll wish to sort out one of many many mountain climbing trails that blaze by means of this Unesco Biosphere Reserve. A reasonably difficult half-day loop takes you from the little mountain village of Chamorga alongside a peninsula that thrusts into the wave-whipped Atlantic. A lot of it’s ridge path, so that you’re nearly always on a excessive, with the views deep into lush ravines, as much as scaly mountains and out to sea turning into more and more dramatic as you method Faro de Anaga lighthouse.
At path’s finish, you possibly can cool off over a drink within the tiny bar subsequent to the chapel and go for a swim off the glinting darkish sands of Playa de Roque Bermejo.
Mirador de Sámara is the hike with the perfect views of Mt Teide
5.1km (3.2 miles) round-trip, 2 hours, reasonable
One of the best view of Mt Teide isn’t while you’re standing proper on high of it. This reasonably difficult volcanic path instructions astonishing ringside views of the enormous cone of Spain’s highest peak. Beginning and ending on the Mirador de Sámara parking zone off the TF-38, the well-signed path slithers by means of the ashen, softly undulating panorama of an ideal crater, with tephra (fragments of rock flung into the air by an erupting volcano) crunching underfoot. It’s fairly steep initially, however it quickly flattens out and makes for pretty mild strolling.
The path is at its most spectacular in late winter or early spring, when Teide is sporting its snow cap and the broom is in full golden bloom. At any time of 12 months, you’ll get shut ups of the Canarian pines which are endemic to the outer Canary Islands. Look and hear out for kestrels, Canarian chiffchaffs and Berthelot’s pipits.
