Karin's photography: March 2010

Tenerife - one of the Canary islands - is a beloved holiday resort for Nordic people in order to escape from the cold winter. This year, I and Kert decided to have a beach holiday in the middle of winter as well. We spent a week in Tenerife and loved its sun, water and interesting places.

Tenerife is situated in the Atlantic Ocean, near African coast. It has about 900 000 inhabitants and enjoys a warm climate all-year round. Besides that, it gives you wonderful nature experiences and views. North, south, east and west are all different. The south is a desert area, where nowadays, all the tourist resorts are located due to its sunny and warm conditions. It rains there seldom, so all green plants are watered artificially. The west is even more drier (it was said to us that it rains only 7 days in a year) and the landscape looks volcanic, mountain Teide looms above everything else. The north part doesn't get as much sunshine as the south and rainfalls are usual - due to the low pressure systems that move in from the north west. However, northern part is a beloved holiday resort for elder people because it doesn't get as hot as in south, and it still has some nice sunny days. It is said that "In Tenerife, there is something for everyone".
We stayed in the south - as it's still Spring time and it's not really hot in south, yet.

Costa Adeje
We lived in the holiday resort called Costa Adeje. It is next to the largest resort Playa de las Americas, but a bit quieter.

Photo: Fanabe beach in Costa Adeje

Photo: Playa la Pinta, our own small beach

Photo: Playa la Pinta at night

Photo: Kert and Fanabe beach

Photo: Our bedroom in the hotel

Photo: Our hotel's pool area

Photo: Kert near the beach

Photo: I in Costa Adeje on the way to the market

Photo: Night in Costa Adeje

Icod de los Vinos

It is a small wine-belt town (we went there for wine-tasting), which has the oldest dragon tree in the islands. It looks from a distance like an umbrella.

The town itself is charming, with its narrow streets, and is worth to wander around.

Photo: I and the old dragon tree - around 2000 years old

Photo: Tenerife bananas. Smaller than the ones coming from South America, but sweeter.

Photo: Icod de los Vinos

Photo: I in Icod de los Vinos, on the way for wine tasting

Teide National Park with Teide mountain - 3718 metres

Mount Teide National Park was established in 1954. It's home for interesting fauna, many birds and some mammals and very popular among tourists to visit. Most of the park lies above 2000 metres and therefore, there are wonderful views over the island in every step.

Mount Teide is the highest peak in Spain and is an active volcano which last erupted in 1909. All landscape around Teide is formed by stones formations originated from volcano.

Photo: View to Teide from the way to the cable car point

Photo: The cable car which we used to go up to Teide's top

Photo: I up on Teide, yes, it's snowy theree

Photo: I and Kert on Teide

Photo: I and Kert and the highest top of Teide

Photo: In Teide National Park

Photo: Teide National park - formations of vulcanic origin

Photo: Teide National Park has specific landscape and many formations originated from vulcano

Photo: I in the park, you see - it was veery windy there

Loro Park - Nature park

Tenerife itself calls the Loro Park as a man-made paradise featuring parrots, killer whales, sea lions, dolphins, penguins, gorillas etc. It is said that Loro Park is the home of the largest parrot's collection in the world.

Photo: Kert in the entrance of Loro Park

Photo: The rain forest in Loro Park

Photo: The dolphin show in Loro Park

Photo: The sea lions show in Loro Park

Siam Park - Water Kingdom

Siam Park is a very new water attraction park in Tenerife - it opened its doors in 2008. It was located very close to our hotel in Costa Adeje. The park covers 185 000 m2 of landscape and is very green. There are many attractions both for children as well as adults and you can spend a whole day there without geting bored.

Photo: Loads of different water attractions in Siam Park, this one is the easiest and most relaxing