Blog Oficial de Turismo de Gran Canaria

Gran Canaria holds many natural and cultural gems seeped in strong symbolism right now.

1. Seeds of hope
Few things embody and symbolise life and the future so profoundly as a seed. Gran Canaria can boast seeds that have been capable of stepping through time to remain in the same spot. Genetic studies have demonstrated that the type of barley still grown on the island today is the same as the ancient prehispanic society planted here more than one thousand years ago. This small miracle of resilience remains wrapped up in the seeds prized by the people living inland in the mid-lands and on the peaks. Their simple gesture keeps the harvest of hope going.

The astronomic viewpoints in Gran Canaria help you really make the most of the Island’s excellent star-gazing conditions.

Frank was born in a place in Gran Canaria where the firmament is just another extension of life and forms part of the culture, the history and the language because you can really speak to the heavens here. Born in San Mateo, he grew up around Cueva Grande (Big Cave), at the island’s peak, where human beings and the infinite seem to go hand in hand. “I have been aware of looking at the sky since I was very little, four or five years old,” recalls this astronomy-mad teacher whose memory is a sort of planetary system around which family celebrations and lunar eclipses orbit and coexist.

Gran Canaria invites you on a 360º trip through some of the amazing hidden spots.

What is that sound in your house today? It sounds like the fast tapping of a tiny hammer. It comes from deep inside the pine forests around the Presa de las Niñas reservoir, inland on Gran Canaria, and it is actually the great spotted woodpeckers hammering away at the pine trunks. You can’t see it, but you can feel it and imagine it on our 360 degree trip around the island that will give you a bird’s eye view, soaring through the air following all the wishes that are closer to coming true with each day that passes. 

At once familiar and yet unprecedented, Gran Canaria’s nature has painted an inspiring work of art on a blank canvas.

When nobody is looking, the dunes shift stealthily and share their secrets with the wind and the ocean in their whispering language. The silent sea of sand in Maspalomas has made the most of this hiatus to rewrite itself and get back to its roots. It only took a couple of days for the breeze to erase the last footprints on the golden sheen of the great sand bank in the south of Gran Canaria and restore its appearance from more than half a century ago.

A magical trip taking you right to the heart of the island of Gran Canaria without ever leaving your living room #stayathomesavelives.

Beyond your windows, balconies and walls, the landscape of the future can still be glimpsed. The light that shines through your windows is also a reflection of life with an ever-beating heart. And in some places, it’s beating particularly strongly. Do you know where? Just look out of the window. Or close your eyes and set off on a voyage in your mind’s eye to Gran Canaria, the island that awaits you. The adventure is starting right now, in your home, right on the next line...

Gran Canaria is inviting you to spread your wings and use your imagination to discover an amazing, magical island that lets you dream about the future.

Finca La Laja reflects the generous and diverse landscape of Agaete Valley, in Gran Canaria.

High up, in Tamadaba Crag, the pine forest juts out, and the water oozing from the Stone shines like a mirror or a silver sheet under the sun. About one thousand metres below, at the foot of the ridge, in Finca La Laja, deep in the heart of Agaete Valley (Gran Canaria), Víctor Lugo Jorge, fifth generation of a family whose history intertwines with the roots of centenary trees, offers in his hands the fruits just harvested from the coffee plants that grow under the shade of orange trees and vines, escorted by a tropical garden of mangoes, avocados and guayabos.

Artenara, located at Gran Canaria’s summit, keeps alive a unique tradition linked to the heart of the volcanic rock, of a purity hard to find in today’s day and age.

The artist Miró Mainou used to search the light looking for the truth. Maybe for this reason he settled in Artenara for over a decade, a village where life draws every day on a canvas of light and calm, the customary stage of a village nestled on the border of a colossal volcanic basin and the doors to Heaven. Here, Mainou’s brushes found the light, and here he won the Canary Islands Fine Arts Award, when he portrayed in lights and shadows the essence of the landscape, in paintings such as ‘Cumbre’ (‘Summit’). Nowadays, the mural painted by the students of Gran Canaria’s School of Art & Design recreates the piece on the façade of the house where the artist lived between 1977 and 1989.

Cruz de Tejeda, in Gran Canaria, is the geographical and historical centre, where the island’s inner voice is heard.

“You have to put a kind face to life”. Manuel Ortega was born in a family who used to farm the land and look after a small herd of sheep, some goats and one or two cows, while working at the water galleries in Gran Canaria’s high land. Maybe for this reason his conversation flows like a stream. “I enjoy talking to people” says Manuel while he strokes the back of his noble four-legged companion, Bartolo, an introvert and calm donkey whose job is to be ridden by anyone who wants to get to know Cruz de Tejeda’s surroundings, a crossroad and geographical, touristic, historical and even emotional epicentre of the island, located above one thousand five hundred metres of altitude, looming over an amazing volcanic basin.

Valleseco, in the green heart of Gran Canaria, wraps the visitor in a blanket of nature, tradition and flavours.

Valleseco wakes up at dawn and goes to sleep at night to the lulling sound of water. The washing pools, the remains of old mills, galleries and canals make a mirror where the town looks at itself every morning, reflecting a wide natural range of infinite shades of green.

The village of Tejeda, located at Gran Canaria’s highest point, looms into an amazing volcanic basin, and keeps surprisingly alive ancient scents and roots.

Barranco de los Cernícalos, in Gran Canaria, transports you to the most natural and mysterious side of the island.

Pay careful attention, because we are about to enter one of those spots that makes us feel like we are floating around a lost world, but which is actually much nearer than we think. Yes, listen and look very carefully, because each stone, each plant and each chirping of a bird have a story to tell.  A walk around Barranco de los Cernícalos, on the southern slopes of Gran Canaria, takes us into the most unspoilt part of the island, and brings us face to face with its most ancestral and wild side.