tenerife

[Lurker]

If you like Tenerife you'd LOVE Lanzarote! Make a diary note.

Lanzarote is definitely high the list of places to go on holiday, especially having seen cavesoflanzarote.co.uk! But there happened to be cheap flights to Tenerife on the dates we were looking at, so that will do nicely for this year. In the meantime, if you could knock up a cavesoftenerife.co.uk that would be grand 
Lurker

 

[Les W]

Thanks for the replies - very useful. The video looks great, I can't wait! Those names should be plenty to get us started.
Lurker

If you know which caves you are going to visit I can give you precise instructions on how to find them (it's not always obvious even when you are right by them). 

It took quite a few years to locate all the major caves, they are quite difficult to find...  :-\

No problems,
If you know which caves you are going to visit I can give you precise instructions on how to find them (it's not always obvious even when you are right by them). 

Right, like when I parked outside Cueva del Viento and asked where the cave was and they looked at me kind of funny, parted the bushes beside the car and showed me the entrance!

This is easy to find when you know where it is but impossible if you don't...

 

[Lurker]

We had an excellent time in Tenerife. San Marcos proved elusive - we reckoned we might be able see where it might be but couldn't work out how to get there. We did find Cueva de Candelaria and the upper entrance to Cueva del Viento though and were very impressed.

Turns out the warning about crawling in lava tubes being painful and bad for your clothing are quite correct...

We also found out about a walk high above Guimar which follows an old water course along a contour in a precipitously steep sided valley. It's very dramatic and worth doing. At several points the conduit passes through some tunnels (100m long perhaps) to avoid cliffs, so it almost counts as caving. Some of the tunnels have holes in the side where you can look out over the valley far below.

I think you can just about make out some of the 'windows' in this photo:

 

[Les W]

We had an excellent time in Tenerife. San Marcos proved elusive - we reckoned we might be able see where it might be but couldn't work out how to get there. We did find Cueva de Candelaria and the upper entrance to Cueva del Viento though and were very impressed.

The route to Cueva San Marcos was obstructed by cliff stabalisation works last year. You could still approach from the top road but it is hard to find and you need to dodge the Guardia Civil.

Turns out the warning about crawling in lava tubes being painful and bad for your clothing are quite correct...

A quote from a good friend of mine "Caving in lava tubes is like swimming naked in a bottle bank"

 

[mrodoc]

The Guimar walk looks fun. Haven't been to Tenerife for years. Last time we just walked into San Marcos and did the through trip. It is listed in a book of natural history walks on Tenerife.

 

[benjisail]

Hi,

I am a french caver and I am looking for information about lava tubes in Tenerife and it is hard to find on the Internet... I just discovered this old post with some interesting information!
I am currently on Tenerife with my family for 1 extra week and I am not able to find any good information to visit a few accessible lava tubes (not too difficult to access as it will be a family visit . San Marcos is now closed with a gate...
If you could help me with a shortlist of caves worst visiting with at least the GPS position it would be great !
Currently, her is the map of all caves that I found on Tenerife using Open Street Map database -> http://overpass-turbo.eu/s/Pew

Thanks

 

[mrodoc]

Have you tried the lower entrance of San Marcos that opens out onto the Cove? It is a letter box sized slit in the cliff (not the larger blind cave further along). Here is a photo. It is many years since I have visited Tenerife and the caves seem to have become difficult to access. Here is photograph of the entrance area of San Marcos on the cliffs. there is a path to it from the road going up the hill. out of the town.

 

[benjisail]

It is the entrance of San Marcos visible on this log of geocaching which is now closed -> https://www.geocaching.com/seek/log.aspx?LUID=bdef8438-486b-4c41-b66a-4e2f42fbbba4&IID=a4e99612-2299-495a-bd9a-56f296c8a789
A french caver who went this year to Tenerife reported the same with the entrance being closed and the owner of the land nearby and requesting 15 euros per person to open the gate...
Is the lower entrance the one visible on the picture on geocaching or an other one ?
Do you know any other lava tube easily accessible on Tenerife ? For example I saw multiples caves on the road going to Teide on Open Street Map. For example Cueva de Samara, Cueva de los Pajaros, Cueva de Chajora, Cueva Negras, ...

Thanks !

 

[mrodoc]

the top entrance is in a banana plantation and the bottom entrance is in the cliffs I posted a photograph of.  We did the through trip. When I was there 20 years ago or so you could walk into Cueva del Viento, on the outskirts of Icod. This used to be the longest known lava tube in the world but I don't know whether that one is open nowadays.

 

[LarryFatcat]

I did the through trip at San Marcos about 20 years ago too, we just asked about at the cafe near the harbour and a local guided us in for a?10 tip. It's spacious though a little sharp- no water wear. I understand that parts of Del Viento had been destroyed by development.