Category Archives: Canary Islands

Earthquakes in the Canaries

Tenerife

“And it all looks so peaceful: view south over the El Paso basin to Cumbre Vieja, focal point for any eruption”

Since October 7th there have been a series of volcanism-related small earthquakes on La Palma, non of them noticeable by the population — as they are so deep (about 27km beneath the earth’s surface). While vulcanologists say this is very normal on an active island, they are meeting on a daily basis to keep an eye on the situation. On 10th October, some more quakes were noted near Tenerife — also not too bad, but one of them was 4 on the Richter scale.

Route closures on Tenerife!

Tenerife route closures

We’ve just received the following update from a user regarding Tenerife (14/03/2015).

There have been serious rock falls in the upper Orotava Valley affecting Walks 5 and 6.

Walk 6 (‘Above Los Organos’) is closed by a substantial wooden barrier at the 45 minute-point (the “important junction”). Unfortunately we saw no indication at the start of the walk that anything was amiss, so we didn’t find out until we had climbed to this junction and had to come back down again.

Walk 5 was closed at the Choza Pedro Gil, by tape and “keep out” notices. This is a popular walk from La Caldera, and walkers were ignoring the closure. There is plenty of debris (and larger rocks) on the track, and the hillside above the Casa del Agua and approaching Llano de los Corrales looks very unstable and ready to fall. It would be highly dangerous in wet weather. There is a further official closure notice beyond El Topo.

There was no indication as to how long these closures would last, but if the whole hillside requires stabilizing it could be some time.

Winter Flights from Heathrow to Gran Canaria

gran canaria

As of 26 October British Airways will have a winter service from London Heathrow direct to Gran Canaria. It will be a weekly flight on Saturdays and will run until 29 March 2014. Fares start at £198.

The winter months are the ideal time to explore this captivating destination using Sunflower’s walking guide Landscapes of Gran Canaria. Every year millions of tourists flock to Gran Canaria, ‘the island of eternal spring’, to soak up the sun. But few of these sun-worshippers explore beyond the beaches.

The weather may be the island’s strong point, but by no means is it Gran Canaria’s only asset. A wealth of diverse landscapes and a wonderland of curious flora await the explorer. So special are these ecosystems, that almost half the island has been designated a nature protection or preservation area. It’s hard to believe that such a small island (1532 sq km/600 sq mi) has so much to offer. And yet it has often been referred to as a ‘continent in miniature’. Travel across Gran Canaria for a day, by car or on foot, and you will see for yourself! The view across the cumbre to Rocque Nublo seen in the photograph above is just one example of the stunning landscapes. (And that’s Tenerife, with El Teide mountain, visible in the distance.)

For car tours or walks in Gran Canaria there is no better guidebook than Sunflower’s Landscapes of Gran Canaria.

Tenerife adopts EU standard waymarking

Tenerife waymarking

In the last couple of years signposting and waymarking of walks on Tenerife has been brought in line with EU standards. At the same time, quite a few new trails have been opened. There are

  • red/white-waymarked GR routes (‘grandes recorridos’ – long distance walks),
  • yellow/white-waymarked PR routes (‘pequeños recorridos’ – short trails of up to six hours), and
  • green/white-waymarked SL routes (‘senderos locales’ – local trails up to a maximum of 10km long).

So there was no question about what to do in Tenerife during our Christmas and New Year’s holidays! The Seventh edition of Sunflower’s Tenerife guide was due for an update. Meanwhile we’d been getting conflicting reports from users about walk numbering … and about new trails criss-crossing our routes.

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