South of Gran Canaria, Andén del Zurrado in Barranco de Arguineguin ravine, circular route

If this pic gives you vertigo, don’t go

Well, I would like to start by expanding on the caption above. The main point of this hike, at least for me, was to see and walk a spectacular “Andén del Zurrado”, andén* being a pass or a path in a precipitous place, in this case with a strong emphasis on precipitous. There is no real danger, of which later, but if you have a fear of heights, it can get really tricky for you.

OK, warning done, back to the walk. A pic of Andén del Zurrado came up in Facebook and we started planning the walk immediately. The main problem of this walk is logistics, not the difficulty, once you are sure that everybody in your group can handle heights.

So, first problem, the transport. There is no public transport that come close to the start of the walk, at least I can’t find any. The nearest stop of Global is about 7 km out, so not a viable option.

Faneque, the first attempt

Faneque, as seen from Tamadaba campsite viewpoints. Teide floating serenely on his cushion of clouds

Faneque, the tallest above-sea cliff in Europe, is always very prominent when you are in the northwest of Gran Canaria. It looks infinitely majestic and quite, quite forbidding. The side view gives you an impression of a series of three plateaus, separated by sharp V-shaped drops. Plus, people always talk about “the last platform” or “the last point”, which contributes to the same impression. It’s not really true, of which later.

El Camino del Cartero, The Postman’s path, Gran Canaria

La Aldea de San Nicolás to the left. To the right, a new road.

La Aldea de San Nicolás, or simply La Aldea, is the least accessible village of all on Gran Canaria. There are three roads leading to it — one from Mogan, another from Agaete, and another from the central part of the island, Artenara and Tejeda. All three of these roads are quite long on the island’s scale, narrow, curvy and difficult, and at least two of them close whenever it rains. Emergency services occasionally have to go to La Aldea by helicopter, which of course has its own limitations.

Double dose of spring, Gran Canaria

Almonds of Tejeda

This year, since we are allowed to go out and look at the beautiful spring of Gran Canaria, we try to do it as much as possible. Last spring, as I am sure everyone remembers, all or nearly all of Europe was in quarantine. What not everybody knows, perhaps, is how unnecessarily draconian the quarantine was in Spain. We were not allowed to go out of the house except for necessities. Said necessities didn’t include walking or any other form of outdoor physical exercise. Only dog owners were allowed to walk their pets, which give raise to infinite number of memes showing dogs being walked to exhaustion.

Even after we were finally allowed to get out a bit, the requirement of not getting too far from the house was imposed, thus preventing us from seeing the last flowers of spring. So, this year we try to compensate for that. I already did a number of hikes which I haven’t attempted before, and maybe I will write about some of them in details, but this post is here just to show the spring flowers and give very brief indicators as to where and when they could be seen.

Grand Canyon of Gran Canaria — Punta de las Arenas or Playa de Artenara

Smooth sandstone walls, arches, caves and grottoes

While we continue to live in a situation where very few leisure things work*, we have to make do on our own the best we can. Last week we arranged a couple of hikes and I would like to record them. I’ll start with the last one, a hike to Punta Arenas aka Punta de las Arenas, Punta de las Arenas Blancas, a relatively short hike between the old road to La Aldea de San Nicolas and a light colored sandstone cape below it. The various names of the place all refer to Arenas, i.e. sands. I read that what is now sandstone used to be the sand of a beach which due to geological processes has risen above the level of the sea and is now effectively a fossil of a beach. The sandstone is pale yellow, hence the name of Arenas Blancas, i.e. white sands.

The cape, as seen from the beginning of the walk. Most of the path down is done in the shade

Cruz de Tejeda — Pico de Las Nieves

Million euro view

Pico de Las Nieves is the highest point of Gran Canaria, some 1,949 metres above sea level.
Except it's not really the highest point, because its neighbor rocky outcrop with a hole in it, Morro de la Agujereada, i.e. Holey Mountain, is a few meters taller. But you can't get on the top of Agujereada safely and easily, so Pico de Las Nieves is sold as The Summit.*  It's where you get the classic, the most postcardy view, with Roque Nublo, Roque Bentayga and Teide on Tenerife all in front of you.
I have been to it a few times, even watched the sun setting from there, but somehow failed to write it up.

Barranco de los Cernícalos — water!

A small waterfall a bit off the path

Finally, I’ve seen all three places where water always runs on Gran Canaria. Well, actually, there are just two left, poor Barranco de La Mina having been killed off by the owner of the water*. So, now on Gran Canaria you have just two places where freshwater runs all year round — Barranco de Azuaje and Barranco de los Cernícalos, Kestrels’ ravine.