Teide

Roques de Garcia / Teide CC image by Wladyslaw

Mount Teide is the volcanic peak at the centre of Tenerife. It's the third largest volcano in the world by volume. As we travel up beyond the tree line, the landscape starts looking like the surface of another planet and the huge scale of the lava flows are hard to comprehend. At first glance it looks pretty desolate but specialised plants have adapted to survive in this harsh high altitude environment. They have plenty to overcome: high levels of UV radiation, extremes of temperature and a lack of water and nutrients. Conditions can change dramatically over the course of 24 hours.

Here are some of the species you might see.


The Teide National Park was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2007. You can read its action plan which helps to protect the site's wildlife. We follow a designated trail around part of the Las Canadas caldera and its strange rock formations (below). The current peak of the mountain, Pico de Teide, is small in comparison with the volcano which existed here previously: it's hard to imagine that the caldera is only the remains of this peak which collapsed about 160 thousand years ago.

Lava tubes in the rocks of the caldera © Rhiannon 2015