Tenerife Boasts Volcanoes, Resorts, Beaches — Especially Gardens

Day 93, 2025 Grand World Voyage

Monday, April 7, 2025; Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands.

Tenerife is one of those islands that, in my opinion, you need to get out of town to see. Today, on my third visit here, I chose to focus on its gardens.

I like to think of the Canary Islands as Europe’s Caribbean, sporting a subtropical climate and numerous beaches. They are part of Spain, so the Euro is the local currency, Spanish is the language, and tourism is the main industry.

On my first visit in 2011 (two years before I started blogging), I was amazed at the beauty of Tenerife’s northern coast, where narrow winding roads took us to villages tucked between the rocks and the sea. Two years ago, my sisters and I joined friends for a small-group tour to Mount Teide, the tallest peak in Spain. Today as we headed to the island’s west coast, we frequently saw its distinctive volcanic cone in the distance.

Today’s Holland America half-day shore excursion took us to three gardens, two of which are in Puerto de la Cruz, a small city about 20 miles from the cruise pier in Santa Cruz de Tenerife. Now a major tourist destination, Puerto de la Cruz originally thrived due to the role the Canary Islands played in European exports.

The Botanic Gardens, or La Orotava Acclimatisation Gardens, date back to 1788 to meet the need to cultivate plants from the New World and the tropics. Perhaps here they could acclimate to Spanish soil. Our allotted 45 minutes to explore the paths in this garden could have used the help of a guide.

Our tour guide was good at relating history both of the island and the gardens, but didn’t accompany us inside. Fortunately, markers describe the various plants and their origins, occasionally offering more interesting information, such as for a Kwango giant cycad from Angola:

“This lone female specimen has been quietly growing here for over a century, biding its time until it was hand-pollinated, courtesy of an equally elderly long wolf male of the same species living in a distant part in Malaga (continental Spain), and bore its first seeds in 2002. The descendants of this pairing can be found in the surroundings.”

Our next stop was the Historic Orchid Gardens of Sitio Litre, a once private garden of a British merchant family. It’s really more of an English garden and is featured in the paintings of Marianne North, whose paintings hang at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in London. Other famous visitors include Agatha Christie and the father of Oscar Wilde.

Before returning to Santa Cruz de Tenerife, we stopped to walk along the waterfront, with its swimming pools designed by local artist Cesar Manrique, restaurants, souvenir shops and boardwalk.

Our last stop back in the port was the Palmetum, a 30-acre garden with the largest collection of tropical palm trees in the world, all built on an old landfill. Again, our stop was simply too short even for walking the loop through the garden. At the center is an octagon – a half-sunken area providing shade for the most delicate plants. I quickly realized after passing the top of its waterfall that I didn’t have time to go farther.

I did admire a peculiar tree that is critically endangered in its natural habitat in Cuba. The Palmetum has the largest cultivated group outside Cuba, and its rigid leaves have been chosen for the Palmetum logo.

From the top of the Palmetum we had a good view of the Auditorio de Tenerife, designed by Santiago Calatrava.

Last night was a tremendously successful party: At the Hop! The Crow’s Nest was transformed into party central, with live music by the FantaSea combo and the dance floor full of passengers, officers and crew alike rockin’ ‘round the clock, as they say.

I was surprised at the number of women in poodle skirts and Pink Ladies jackets. Obviously, they planned ahead. Others did a great job combining bobby socks, scarves, full skirts, cuffed jeans and white shirts.

As usual, Capt. Frank and his wife Alexandria set the standard.