The Canary Islands has not always been on my list for visiting. I had a
view in my head of big hotels, resorts, fake beaches and a crazy amount of
tourists. Since I moved to Spain, I thought I would have to give it a try.
Surprisingly Tenerife showed me that the Canaries are more than a
touristic hub spot, with plenty of nature and enough ways to avoid
tourists and relax in peace.
Volcano El Teide
Get a license if you want to go to the top
Visit the park before 9 in the morning or at night
Hike at La Ruleta Vista
I would say that El Teide volcano is the number 1 attraction on Tenerife.
Of course, if you are on a volcanic island, you can not miss visiting a
volcano at least once.
There are many options to visit the Volcano:
There is a teleferico that goes up to the most accessable point of El
Teide. The Teleferico starts running at 9 in the morning. Make sure
that you book this a couple of days in advance, since there is a high
chance that the tickets are sold out on the spot. Although the views
are beautiful, when you arrive to the "top" with the teleferico, you
are not on the highest top/krater of the Volcano yet. In order to
reach the highest point, you would need to hike up 300m. In order to
maintain safety, there are only 200 persons allowed to do this hike
per day. If you want to do the hike make sure that you book your
license 3-4 months in advance
If you are in good shape and like a challenge, you can also decide to
not take the teleferico and hike up to the top. This hike will take
about 6-8 hours to walk to the top (one way). Don't forget to reserve
your license for the last 300m.
In the case you are not a planner type and did not knew about the
license after the spots are already gone (like most people
experience), there is an third option. If you are a night owl and do
not might being adventures at night, go climb El Teide at night. At
night (before 9 in the morning) you do not need to have the license to
hike the last 300m to the top. The best thing about doing the hike at
night? You will not be alone. I am not talking about scary animals,
but about million of stars surrounding you. El Teide is one of the
best places in the whole world to watch the stars. Many astrological
discoveries has been made in the El Teide area.
El Teide nature park is more than just the El Teide volcano. The whole
nature park around the big volcano includes many other volcano's and
geographical phenomena. We decided not to take any of the above options,
but drove up to the El Teide nature park watch the
sunrise before all the tourists and tour buses arrived. Before 9-10 the
park is still pretty empty, except for some hunters who are searching for
wild rabbits with tons of dogs. The most beautiful part of a sunrise is
always right before the sun comes up, so we decided to
arrive at 7am, one hour before the sunrise. Find a nice
spot to sit and enjoy the view of the world waking up.
After sunrise we went to the "La Ruleta Vista" viewing point, which can be
very crowded with tourists during the day. From this viewing point you can
find the start of a hike with a great view on the volcano and many
information points about the geographical phenomes you will see around
you. You can do this hike in a loop or walk the same way back when you are
not in for a long hike. Before 10 we were one of the few people on the
trail. After 10 the touring buses and Instagram influencers arrive and you
will feel like you are on a school trip with people everywhere.
There are many more hikes to do in the el Teide park. If we had more time,
we would have definitely came back to do other hikes.
"Download the Wikiloc app"
or check out
"the website"
to find all the other hikes.
