The first emblematic hotel in the Canary Islands
With pieces of art
With poolheated
Center wellness
In the heartof Tazacorte
The first emblematic hotel in the Canary Islands
La Palma, one of the western islands of the Canary archipelago, has Santa Cruz de La Palma as its capital and a surface area of 708.32 km² populated by 87,324 inhabitants in 2010, with a very significant presence of foreign residents.
With a very rugged territory (La Palma is the third highest island in the world in relation to its surface area), its highest point is the Roque de los Muchachos (2,426 metres above sea level), where numerous telescopes have been built, making the observatory located there one of the three most important centres of its kind in the world. Its geographical location in the Atlantic and the peculiar climate cause the formation of clouds between 1,000 and 2,000 metres above sea level, which act as a mirror and prevent the already low light pollution of the coastal towns from hindering stargazing. This intensely blue and pure sky by day, black and covered with glittering stars at night, with breathtaking sunrises and multicoloured sunsets of indescribable beauty, is one of the great attractions of La Palma that justifies a visit on its own.
La Palma also has unique landscapes, being known as the "Isla Bonita" or, because of its varied vegetation, as the "Isla Verde", with surprising lava fields that reveal its volcanic origin and that contrast vividly in their blackness with the exuberance and colour of the dense laurel forests (true relics of prehistoric flora) and Canary Island pine, These are also favoured by the unique phenomenon of horizontal rain, produced by the trade winds that bring clouds laden with water to the island's peaks, forming mists that the vegetation condenses. Not to mention the farms in the Aridane Valley or the terraces that cascade down the apparently inaccessible cliffs of Puntallana, San Andrés y Sauces and Barlovento, whose green and exotic banana plantations, cultivated as if they were small gardens, directly or indirectly generate 85 % of the island's GDP and make La Palma the second largest banana-producing island in the Canary Islands, with the highest yields per hectare in the world.
La Caldera de Taburiente, a National Park since 1954, is also a good example of the enormous wealth of the landscape of La Palma. The Caldera stream - the only continuous watercourse in the Canary Islands - runs through the Caldera and is surrounded by peaks of between 1,700 and 2,400 metres in altitude, such as the Caldera de Taburiente. 400 metres high, like Roque de los Muchachos, it is the largest emerged crater in the world, formed more than half a million years ago by a violent landslide that opened up the current caldera, 9 kilometres in diameter and 28 in circumference, in what used to be a volcano.
For all these reasons, it is not surprising that since 2002 the whole island has been declared a Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO, although already in 1983 the area of El Canal and Los Tilos was declared a Biosphere Reserve, making La Palma the first Canary Island to have such a place.
Tazacorte, an agricultural municipality par excellence, is home to some of the best farmland in the Canary Islands, forming a unique landscape of lush banana trees whose green contrasts with the intense blue of the ocean. Tazacorte, due to its location on the west coast of the island and being sixty metres above sea level, has a mild climate throughout the year, unique in the Canary Islands, with little rainfall and a pleasant and permanent warm temperature, being one of the municipalities with the highest number of hours of sunshine in the whole of Spain and the object of the admiration of foreign visitors, who unanimously describe it as one of the best climates on Earth.
From an artistic point of view, La Palma is home to what is probably the most important artistic heritage of Flemish origin in the Canary Islands, the result of trade with Flanders, where, in exchange for the precious sugar produced on the island since the 16th century, magnificent paintings and carvings were imported in the 16th and 17th centuries, which today adorn the numerous churches and chapels that dot the island, not to mention the images and paintings from Andalusia, also the result of fruitful trade relations.
As far as transport is concerned, La Palma has an excellent road network, which has been the object of considerable investment in recent years. By sea, large cruise ships call at the port of Santa Cruz de La Palma, as they will do at the new port of Tazacorte once its enlargement work has been completed. By air, an airport, which doubled its capacity in 2011 after its expansion, ensures passenger transport with the rest of Spain and with various European cities.
With a limited hotel and extra-hotel offer in La Palma, despite its more than obvious attractions, it is not possible to speak of mass tourism. There are few large hotels and a general desire to avoid the construction of large facilities that would inevitably degrade a unique environment with a small surface area. Its visitors are mainly nature-loving tourists who travel to the island to enjoy a series of spectacular landscapes, in most cases completely unspoilt, in which sky, sea and land form a combination of unspeakable and singular beauty.
