Day 107. Santa Cuz deTenerife, Spain

Today's excursion took us to the 3rd largest volcano in the world in Tiede National Park. It was so interesting to see the different topography and climates that we rode through to get there. The volcano sits at about 12,980 ft above sea level. We started out in a slight rain mist until part way up the mountain, only to find that we were in the middle of the clouds. There was a major forest fire there 2 years ago, but the pine trees were still standing. Canary Island Pines can survive fire and produce a lot of water. (Maybe need to introduce these pines to Calif.) After a fire, they only take 7 yrs to recover (otherwise, it takes 100 years). As we continued up the mountain, I noted that the green vegetation was very sparse. I learned that trees can't grow above 7000 ft elevation, so there aren't any trees up there. Towards the top, we passed a NATO site for huge telescopes from Germany, U.S., Taiwan, France, etc. They have an agreement with Spain to allow Spain's researchers 20% of time to use our telescopes. We then passed a caldera that was formed by a different volcanic eruption and another half-moon shaped caldera that was formed by the direction of the wind that was blowing during the eruption. 1909 was last eruption after 2 yrs of earthquakes. The lava that erupts there comes out at 700⁰ vs 1300⁰ for Hawaiian lava. As a result, this volcano throws rocks vs the smooth liquid lava that flows from HI volcano. As we continued, we ascended above the clouds and saw the awesome volcano and unique terrain. It was such a unique and educational excursion.Read more