The Teide National Park is the largest in the Canary Islands. It is a must for all who visit Tenerife. A unique landscape of craters, volcanoes and petrified lava rivers that surround the impressive silhouette of the Teide Volcano, which rises to 3,718 m altitude. The visitors find numerous services that allow them to know and enjoy this space: comfortable accesses by road that crosses the whole Park, two visitor centers that reveal some of their secrets, a restaurant area to regain strength, numerous viewpoints that allow to compose a complete panoramic, an extensive network of trails for visitors wishing to enter the Park and even two accommodations, the National Parador of Las Cañadas del Teide and Altavista Refuge at 3,270 meters. The Teide National Park is one of the great wonders of the world, with the advantage of its easy access and being relatively close to European countries. The whole Park is an extraordinary geological treasure in which volcanoes, craters, chimneys, lava flows and diverse products form an impressive set of colors and shapes. The Cañadas del Teide surprises by its diversity, disturbed by its enormous petrified lava rivers and impresses by its rocks demolished by erosion and by the colossal dimensions of this mineral chaos. In contrast, in the spring it offers a wonderful garden full of flowers and soft aromas, unique in the world. The dominant structure is the Teide, imposing volcanic building that offers a very different aspect depending on the place or time it is observed, always delighting the viewer with its many faces. A sea of volcanic rocks so recent extends to its feet, that the erosion has not had time to alter, conforming a wide catalog of volcanic forms and materials contained in the great amphitheater defined by the wall of Las Cañadas. The wall that surrounds it extends over 25 km. with heights that reach 600m in the area known as Guajara, its high point. This natural cut affects what was another previous volcanic building, which partially disappeared when, 198,000 years ago, the current depression of Las Cañadas was formed by a giant landslide that exposed, in the area of Los Roques, part of its roots , represented by ducts and volcanic chimneys that fed past eruptions. In the cut of the wall, three million years of complex geological history are visible, in which the cycle, slippage and formation of 'un Teide' could be repeated several times. The National Park, located in the center of the island of Tenerife, is the largest and oldest of the four existing in the Canary Islands. In its surface of 190 Km2 (18,990 hectares) the Teide rises up to 3,718 m., Constituting the highest level of Spain. It was declared a National Park in 1954 and in 1989 it received the European Conservation Diploma in its maximum category. It has two visitor centers, one in El Portillo and another in the Parador Nacional, dedicated respectively to the nature and traditional uses of Las Cañadas. In 2007, it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
