Los Tiles Biosphere Reserve La Palma

View from the Mirador Barranco del Carmen   

After the morning’s exertions in the Parque National Caldera de Taburiente we were well overdue for lunch and so we stopped at the Mirador Barranco del Carmen, just north of Santa Cruz del La Palma. We didn’t quite get the views down onto Santa Cruz that we had hoped for but it worked well as a picnic spot. The information boards at the viewpoint were all about star gazing and it’s clearly a place people visit to watch the night sky. La Palma was designated as the world’s first UNESCO-certified Starlight Reserve in 2012 and its observatory houses Europe’s (and possibly the world’s) largest telescope. Situated out in the Atlantic the air is free from pollution and the climate means that 75% of the night skies are clear. As a result, La Palma is apparently a stargazer’s dream location.

We were heading for a different UNESCO site; the Los Tiles Biosphere Reserve. This deep ravine in the northeast corner of the island has been a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve since 1983. It covers 140 square kilometres of beautiful rainforest and is also the largest laurel forest on the island.

Pretty but the wrong path!!!   

On the ‘steep climb up’    

We made for the visitor’s centre up a narrow windy road part way up the ravine. From here there are long hikes up the ravine-side which wind past waterfalls and through tunnels up to the sources of the Marcos and Cordero Springs. They would have been fun to do but we didn’t have enough daylight left. Instead we decided to head up one of the shorter trails up to the Mirador Topo de las Barandas.

We didn’t have a map but there was a sign for the mirador right by our parking space and our guide book described the hike as ‘a steep climb’. Finding ourselves walking beside a lovely level water channel, it quickly became apparent that we were on the wrong path. Doubly so when it routed us in a short circle back to the restaurant beside the visitor’s centre. Back at our car and slightly confused, we spotted a much steeper track hiding in the shadows. That proved to be the correct path and it was indeed ‘a steep climb’.

View from Mirador Topo de las Barandas   

Our start point for the climb up   

The path cut through the dense vegetation and it was like walking in a natural green tunnel. Mostly it was stepped but there were some more level stretches, both up and down, which took us along the side of the ravine. We climbed quickly and eventually popped out on a small plateau on the ridgeline, the Mirador Topo de las Barandas. From here we had a fabulous vantage point from which to look down on the ravine. The only slight disappointment was that the cloud was obscuring the very top. Looking down we could just make out the orange roof of the Visitor’s Centre, the start point for our climb. We savoured the view for a short while and then retraced our steps back down to the car.

Whilst we had only scratched the surface of what the islands have to offer we both feel that the western Canary Islands are somewhere that we could easily spend weeks exploring. There is so much good hiking available on La Gomera and La Palma it’s easy to see why people we’ve met here keep coming back every year.

La Palma, Canary Islands