After a brief 30 minute flight on a small airplane, I arrived at the North Airport of Tenerife from Gran Canaria.

Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Santa Cruz de Tenerife is the second capital of the Canary Islands, along with Las Palmas.

Plaza de España

City center

In some countries they paint trees trunks white. Here they do it with palm trees.

White-painted palm trees

This apparently keeps the trees healthy.

Healthy

So healthy, that the janitors sweep the streets with palm tree branches.

Healthy palms = clean streets

The city center has a mix of modern and classic architecture, but mostly modern.

Street

Museum

Wall

There’s an opera theatre by the sea, which reminds me of something.

Auditorio de Tenerife

In the city center there’s a big mysterious shopping center in the shape of a cube, resembling the Kabba. They even sell Russian Baltika 9 beer.

Cubic shopping center

Many other buildings also look unusually cubic, just like in Las Palmas.

Avenue

Flags of the Canary Islands, Spain and Tenerife

It’s unusual to see Christmas decorations with palm trees.

Decorated palm trees

The bus network on Tenerife is fairly good between cities. I spent three days in Santa Cruz and did a day trip to the Anaga mountains and visited San Andres by bus.

Bus Station

San Andrés

San Andrés is a small town near Santa Cruz with a nice beach. Upon arrival, I was confronted with an unexpected colour pallete for a volcanic island.

Arriving at the beach

It’s not the typical black sand, it’s white. Turns out that the beach is artificial and the white sand was imported from Western Sahara in 1971.

Playa de Las Teresitas

Ship

The village of San Andrés is located on the foothills of the Anaga mountains.

San Andres

Cemetery

Very nice colors.

Street

Side streets

Some door have religious tiles above them, like in Portugal. This one is dedicated to Virgin Mary, specifically the Virgin of Candelaria, who is honored on the island.

Virgin Mary tile