Montaña Roja

We went up Montaña Roja (Red Mountain) a few weeks ago, but somehow I failed to write it up so far. So here goes.

There is no problem with finding the mountain, as it stick out above the dunes of Corralejo in a very obvious way. When doing some preliminary research, I even found a report by a keen runner who went, well, running up to it and then up the slope to the top. Still, I felt that I don’t want to just go in a straight line, as it were, and maybe it would be the best to go with somebody who not only knows where to go (that bit is pretty clear), but also how. Turns out I probably could have gone by myself without too much difficulty, but you never know until you try.

The slope of the mountain that faces the ocean is the steepest, especially the last few meters up, so it probably doesn’t make sense to try to storm it this way. If you start from inland, you can go pretty much anyhow, there are no obvious obstacles — walls, really steep inclines — as far as I could see. There are a few barrancos (gullies) that you might need to cross, but none of the too deep or steep.

You are probably best off if you go up and down along the edge of the wall of the caldera, but we missed that particular path on the way up and went up the inner slope of the crater, at least partially. It is still perfectly doable, but mind where you put your feet — many surfaces of the mountains are covered in small-stone screes, and it’s easy to slip on those.

Views from the top are beautiful. If you have a choice, try to pick a day for a walk with no calima obstructing the view of Lobos and Lanzarote. I was just about able to see both, but only just.

The water at the edge of the ocean has this amazing color which you never see close up.

I believe it is visible in this picture that the slope towards the ocean is steeper than inward one, in the very first picture.

I made a little route showing the way we went. It might be not fully accurate, because we didn’t use a map then and now I can’t match my memories to the googlemaps very well, but it is reasonably close to the truth.

Pictures of Montaña Roja on Shutterstock — here.