The port of Santa Cruz in Tenerife is also home to many luxury, 5-star hotel style ships, which sail between continents, cross oceans and visit exotic islands.
In most cases, luxury ships enter the harbour in the morning and remain berthed until the afternoon to give passengers the opportunity to disembark and take a tour of the beach.
What should you do on a beach tour in Tenerife?
One option is to simply stay in the town of Santa Cruz and explore it on foot. The city centre is relatively small and the Jardin Garcia and the market are only a short walk away. To get to the beach of Santa Cruz you have to take a taxi because the beach ‘Playa Teresitas’ is located 7-8 km north of Santa Cruz, as the whole beach of Santa Cruz is occupied by the huge harbour of Santa Cruz. To get to shopping centres like Mardian and Corte de Inglés, you have to take a taxi as they are a bit far away from the city centre. Between 13.30 and 17.00 hrs.
For those who are not satisfied with just visiting the capital and want to see the unique volcanic nature of Tenerife, there is the option of hiring a beach tour which includes bus transport to selected points of Tenerife and includes instruction in English and other languages. (The service in Hebrew is almost exclusive to ‘Tenerife Local Guide’).
The beach tours are a great opportunity to taste and feel for a day the scent of the island and the Canarian way of life.
It is true that it is not enough to see everything, but a good beach tour is enough to get an idea of the variety of climates, the pleasant temperatures, the spectacular views and the high altitude above sea level and the clouds (up to 3718 above sea level at the peak of Teide).
In Tenerife there is much more than one beach route to choose from, but the most important thing is that the route will include the nature reserve ‘Las Cañadas’ and the Teide as it is the most important and interesting site on the island. You will reach the reserve on trails with unique views. In the remaining time you will be able to visit one or even two more sites.
An example of a beach tour I recently did with Royal Caribbean’s Israeli group:
It began with a visit to the Teide reserve with a stop at two places, the first at the Teide car park in the centre of the reserve, and the second in front of the old peak. In this area there is young lava from the last eruptions on the island of Tenerife.
After the Teide Reserve, we descended towards the south coast just to observe it from 600-1200 metres above sea level, on this day which had excellent visibility we could see the three islands, La Gomera, La Palma and El Hiero.
After reaching an altitude of 600 metres above sea level near a village in the south of Tenerife called Chio, we climbed back up to another village called Santiago del Teide and from there to the summit of Aarhus, the peak that separates the south coast from the north coast, and from there down to a restaurant that literally hangs from the cliff overlooking the north coast and the village of Garachico.
We receive a welcome at the restaurant with canarian forms and local wine and a breathtaking view.
From there we continued to the beautiful town of La Orotava for a short tour through the city centre and to admire the Canarian architecture at its best.
After the tour of La Orotava it was time to return to the port of Santa Cruz, to the Royal Caribbean ship, to finish the tour along the coast and to say goodbye to this lovely group.
