We decided to spend the next day after the wonderful rest in Siam Park for more serious matters – visiting the Teide volcano. The day before we got a new permission to climb to the crater.
Getting to the observation platform on a cable car of course does not require any permission. But the pass to the hiking trail above does. It can be obtained on https://www.reservasparquesnacionales.es
Clear sky and good weather kept our hope to reach the volcano. We really wanted to get to the height of more than 3 km and take a look on the clouds from above, to reach to the crater. Moreover, the highest point we’d visited by that time was Ai-Petri peak in Crimea (just 1234 meters above sea level). Teide could have become a significant breakthrough.
Before Vilaflor we did not even waste time on the stops on: we were in a hurry. Actually, we had stopped here on the way to the Paisaje Lunar before. Afterwards, it was impossible not to stop.
Gradually, after climbing up, we stopped more and more often, so attractive the images with Teide were. However, it was getting cold…
Further, it seemed to be very close, but still was so far:
Finally, we reached Teide. It was suspiciously quiet …
Soon everything became clear:
We asked the personnel whether any changes were possible. After hearing “maybe”, we got some hope and decided to stay in the waiting room, studying the structure and history of the cable road, buying souvenirs in the store, etc.
However, no change was observed. Only one cabin with workers went upwards. We drove down to take a bit more pictures at the foot of Teide. It wasn’t easy to keep the camera in the wind 🙂
Vitya even suggested to hike – that is how he was upset, but Nastya rejected this offer of the romantic trip 🙂
The weather was not changing, so we decided to move forward to the north. But we were again unlucky: after half of kilometer the road was blocked by the traffic police due to the snow.
We went back to the waiting hall, wandered a bit, and surfed the web. Cableway was not starting, but in an hour the road was opened for the vehicles. For us it was a great success 🙂
On the way to La Orotava we were looking for the “Stone Flower” which was not easy to find. A flower was not visible from the road: you need to find the right parking lot first, and then go down by foot. Stone Flower was amazing, even photo does not let you understand how magnificently creative the nature was with it.
We do not have coordinates of this place – only the picture of our car at the Mirador Piedra La Rosa:
Then we got to La Orotava – an ancient town at the island of Tenerife.
To what place do you want to go?
We were wandering through the quiet streets.
And entered a local church.
After that, we said bye to this town, being a little disappointed with the failure of the Teide, although determined to conquer it the next day.
Next time, we will tell you whether we were finally lucky in conquering Teide.
No Comments