TENERIFE in the Canary Islands is a year-round favourite with British holidaymakers for its sunshine, scenery, family friendly resorts, and great bars and restaurants.
But there’s more. If you’ve never been, here’s a Top 10 must-see guide...
1 SIAM PARK Above Los Cristianos, this is as much fun as you can have with your Speedos on. This fairly new attraction has wave machines, scary flumes and a mile-long lazy river. The Tower of Power, a 100ft high near-vertical slide, takes you through an aquarium. www.siampark.net.
2 EL MEDANO Barely a 20-minute drive from Tenerife South Airport, El Medano looks like a scruffy place. But that’s its charm.
It’s a typically Spanish town with a good beach – kitesurfing is popular here – a fishing harbour and lots of tapas bars. And the main hotel in the town, the Hotel Medano (www.hotelmedano.es), is perched over the sea.
3 MOUNT TEIDE Tenerife’s crowning glory is its volcano, Mount Teide, soaring 3,718 metres above Las Canadas National Park.
To get to it you drive through pine forests until you emerge on to a lunar landscape of volcanic rock. In good weather, there’s a cable car which will take you to the top for 20 euros.
4 GRAND CARNIVAL PARADE Carnival time in Tenerife is a cross-dressing hoot. It’s the biggest carnival in Europe and for two weeks before Lent, swarthy men parade through the island’s capital Santa Cruz wearing fishnet tights, lipstick and mini-skirts. Visit www.spain.info/uk.
5 LA LAGUNA La Laguna was once the island’s capital and is now a university town with pretty old Canarian buildings. It’s packed with students, so the nightlife is lively. Don’t miss Iglesia de la Concepcion: the island’s first church.
6 LOS ABRIGOS Fish, almost any you can think of, from bass to bream, is on sale in most of the traditional restaurants. Some of the best are in the village of Los Abrigos, which is packed with locals at weekends.
7 GARACHICO Garachico is a lovely old town in the northwest of the island that has a proper Spanish feel to it, with tapas bars, a town square, an old church and a collection of lava rock pools. Book into the San Roque Hotel (www.hotelsanroque.com), a former manor house.
8 LOS GIGANTES Los Gigantes is a collection of apartments and hotels tumbling down to the sea with a dramatic backdrop of enormous dark cliffs.
9 ANAGA HILLS The Anaga range of hills, in the north of the island, is covered in ancient gnarled forests. From the top you will get a spectacular view of rugged cliffs and the pounding Atlantic surf.
10 WINE In the past 20 years, wine-making has enjoyed a renaissance. Try the fruity Vina Norte. Tenerife tourist info: www.turismodecanarias.com.