Ruta del Agua & the Barranco de Badajoz, Guimar

San Juan, Guimar 

The Ruta del Agua (Water Route) is a walk from the San Juan district of Guimar to the old hydro-electric station built in 1924 for the supply of electricity to the town and surrounding district. This took advantage of the very steep terrain and the numerous water gallerias that fed water downhill via a network of tajeas, or water channels.

Walking Tenerife's Badlands

Puerto de Güimar

Last week, I finally got around to walking the Malpais de Güimar, the volcanic coastline close to Puerto de Güimar on the east coast of Tenerife. This walk has been on my 'to do' list for some time and while it doesn't present much of a challenge either in time or effort required, it did prove to be a fascinating walk. Starting from the pleasant, if unremarkable seafront of Puerto de Güimar, the walk starts by an information board at the edge of the malpais and there are a couple of routes to choose from.

The Malpais de Güimar

I decided to follow the coastal path to the village of El Socorro and then return through the lava-fields at the base of the volcanic cinder cone of Montaña Grande. The word 'malpais' translates as 'badlands' and almost any area of volcanic wasteland in Tenerife gets saddled with this rather sinister sounding title. The lava in this instance issued forth from Montaña Grande a mere 10,000 years ago, so the area, geologically speaking, is in it's infancy. I was fortunate enough to have picked a gloriously sunny morning for my walk and set off from the edge of the village, passing ramshackle fisherman's shanties on the edge of the shore.

The Salt Flats

I followed the well-defined path as the sun sparkled on the Atlantic Ocean, the dramatic mountains of the Güimar Valley forming a fantastic, contrasting backdrop to the black, cardón strewn lava. As I approached the next information board, I noticed a number of flat, rectangular areas set in the lava and the board explained that these were 'slat flats', where sea water would become trapped and evaporate in the sun leaving behind the sea salt. Continuing, I arrived at the 'summit' of Montaña de la Mar, which at 27 metres above sea-level, barely qualifies for the title 'montaña' but on the top I found another information board explaining how the malpais came into being. The elevation, though modest, also gave an excellent aerial view of the lava fields. After around an hour of walking, I arrived at the village of El Socorro. Here, I found a pleasant stretch of black sand beach, which provided an excellent opportunity for a breather and I sat for a while in the hot sunshine watching the waves breaking on the shore before heading off through the village to locate the return path.

Montaña Grande

El Socorro, although pleasant enough, is unfortunate in that it has a large industrial estate backing onto it and as I left the village, I skirted the edge of the incongruously situated warehouses before picking up the path to Montaña Grande. Leaving the industry behind, I now followed a wide path to the volcanic cone, where it became covered in sand and yet another information board informed me that this originated from the beach at El Socorro, having been blown there by the wind. There are two routes around the foot of the cone and I had chosen the one closest to the sea as the other paralleled the TF1 motorway too closely for my liking. From Montaña Grande, I followed the easy path back to Puerto de Güimar, where I relaxed with a drink in the square on the seafront at one of cafes after a fairly easy but fascinating walk of around three hours.  

The Guimar Valley & The Candelaria Trail

I have long had a fascination with the Guimar Valley from a walkers viewpoint for a couple of reasons. One is that it doesn't feature very much in walking guidebooks, and two, because I always think it's one of the most spectacular sights on the island when viewed from the TF1. One walk that does feature in the guidebooks is the Candelaria Trail, an old pilgrims route from La Orotava to Candelaria, over the top of the island. Nowadays, because of building development, it is usually started from Aguamansa and finished in Arafo, which is where I decided to start the walk from. The plan was to climb to the cumbre road between La Esperanza and El Portillo at La Crucita and then turn round and walk back to Arafo. This involved about six hours of walking and around 5,000ft of ascent and descent. A tough sounding walk, which it was, but what a walk!Climbing out of Arafo was hard enough on the seemingly vertical tarmac lanes but after leaving the roads, the climbing just went on and on and on, seemingly never ending and very steep. After leaving the tarmac, the path snaked uphill through pine forest, past an old water channel. Eventually, the route broke free of the pines and the views were simply stupendous, along the coast to Guimar, Candelaria and Santa Cruz below but up ahead, the most amazing sight of a mountain boiling away like an old kettle, as cloud swirled around the summit in an otherwise blue sky. Upon reaching an old stone shelter, I came across a rather incongruous bath-tub sitting by a huge mound of spiky chestnut casings as the huge black sand mound of Las Arenas came into view ahead. I have to say that by this time I was really feeling the climb. The relentless steepness was taking it's toll and I was still around and hour and a half to the cumbre road. I was now totally enclosed by mountains and plodding at a very slow pace. My resolve nearly gave out when the path became much steeper and covered in loose red picon. Eventually, after much puffing and blowing, I reached the cumbre road and had a break for lunch with fantastic views of Teide.Setting off back downhill, I slithered back down the slippery path and as I neared Las Arenas mountain for the second time, I had the strange experience of being under clear blue, sunny skies with rain blowing into my back. Looking back, I could see that the cumbre was now invisible, covered in a grey blanket of cloud. I assumed that it must be raining high up and the strong winds on the top were blowing it downhill, into the valley. As I descended further, I realised that the rain was following me down the valley but I seemed to be staying just ahead of it in the sunshine. As I passed the the black cone of Las Arenas, I suddenly became aware of a rainbow in a shallow valley about 150 metres to my left. I could actually see where it touched the ground at both ends! As I rounded a bend in the track, one end of the rainbow was actually touching the track a few yards in front of me!I continued past the chestnut trees I had seen earlier to the stone shelter and the source of the empty shells became apparent as an old man sat in front of the shelter, removing the casings from them and adding to the enormous mound in front of him. I descended the last section back into Arafo fairly rapidly, observing another rainbow off in the distance as I went. I have to say that I have done some spectacular walking both here and in other locations but this walk was one of the most stunning but exhausting I have ever done.