Despite its predictably sunny
weather and the wide variety of
landscapes that attract millions of
tourists every year,
Tenerife has a
bit of an image problem, thanks
largely to the attentions of the
package tourism industry. As a
result the entire island is
commonly, though rather mistakenly,
assumed to be just a playground for
the hordes of rowdy, booze-fuelled
holiday-makers looking for sun, sea
and often sex in the island's large
resorts, particularly Playa de las
Américas. And though most visitors
largely content themselves with lazy
days on the beach, there are plenty
of opportunities to be more active
and go surfing, windsurfing,
sailing, diving or deep-sea fishing.
Tenerife first established itself
as a holiday destination over a
century ago when it became a
fashionable place for the
aristocracy of Europe to spend the
winter months. Since then, but
particularly in the last fifty
years, during which time mass-tourism
has become a major global industry,
the numbers of holiday-makers have
vastly increased. Today the island
gets over four million annual
visitors who, together with the
thousands of northern Europeans
settling here, have significantly
changed the personality of the
island.
Though commonly viewed by
independent travellers as an
aesthetic and social curse that has
distorted the cultural landscape and
cloaked vast areas in concrete, mass
tourism has also guaranteed
plentiful and excellent services in
the resorts towns and cheap
flights to the island. And if
the resort honey-pots aren't to your
taste, you'll find that it's easy to
leave the mass of holiday-makers
behind. Despite the compactness of
the island that puts most areas of
the island within an easy day
trip of its resorts you won't
find many other foreigners in the
island's vibrant, unpretentious and
distinctly Canarian urban centres
and only a small stream of hikers in
its mountainous regions .
Here it's easy to find great quiet hiking
trails , a couple of good climbing
areas , as well as some quiet
(though hilly) backroads and dirt
roads for cycling and mountain
biking . And for those wanting
to get even further from the
humdrum, there's the option of
heading out to hike or bike on the
strikingly precipitous and laid-back
nearby island of La Gomera.
